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Pearl was holding the human cub at arm's length, inspecting it with wary eyes.
“...I don't like it,” she concluded.
Garnet snorted, but Rose chuckled, gentle.
“You don't even know her yet,” she said.
“It's a human,” Pearl explained, “and I don't–”
“We know,” Garnet reminded her.
“Oh! We should think of a name!” Rose said.
Pearl furrowed her brow as she turned the cub around, then upside down, then back to its original position.
“How are you supposed to tell without a gem?” She asked.
“No, Pearl, humans give each other names. They usually choose them for their babies. Although sometimes they choose their own names when they're older.”
“Yes, I know all that,” Pearl lied, “but how do they choose?”
“That's the beauty of it, they just do! Humans can have all sorts of names! They can even have unique names no other human has had before.”
“Nice,” Garnet said. Pearl shuddered in discomfort. Like all things human, it all seemed very…barbaric.
“Oh, do you know, one time I met a human named Pearl!” Rose explained, “except, it was in a language they didn't speak. A language no human had spoken for a thousand years, actually. I tried to figure out if it was a coincidence or if the name was connected to this planet's natural pearls, but it was no use. It was just a name to her. Him? I forget”
“Hmmm,” Pearl hummed. She wasn't too comfortable with the thought of humans named Pearl. It seemed to her she already had to share the name with enough gems as it was, even if they weren’t exactly around. But she supposed it made sense. Humans liked pearls, they collected them, used them for aesthetic purposes. And Pearl had seen how they doted on their youth. It made sense that one of them would name their cub after a thing they treasured even if it provided no actual value. She was distracted from that line of thought when the cub in her hands made a vocalization and she yelped in surprise, shoving it into Garnets's arms.
“Your turn!” She said.
Garnet stared at the creature, holding it much closer than Pearl had. The creature stared back, then grabbed her nose.
“I like this one,” Garnet decided. Pearl rolled her eyes. There went her last hope. Rose was definitely going to keep the orphaned thing now. “I want to call it Pearl.”
“HWHAT!” Pearl yelled. Rose chuckled.
“I like it,” she said.
“Absolutely not,” Pearl protested, “I refuse to be associated with-” she gestured vaguely at the cub, “that.”
“You know, in human families, sometimes when two members share the same name they indicate it in some way or another,” Rose commented, not even acknowledging Pearl’s complaint, “we could do that!”
“Or we could name it something else! Better yet, we could find some other human to take it away. Let them come up with a name.”
“Hmm. No,” Garnet said. Pearl sighed.
“Why would you even want to name it Pearl?”
“She’s had a rough start,” Garnet explained, “And it’s only going to get harder from here. She’s going to need to be strong.”
“Pearls are hardly known for their resilience,” Pearl countered.
Garnet didn’t say anything, she just focused on the cub. Rose elbowed Pearl.
“She’s talking about you,” she whispered in her ear.
Pearl tensed and blushed, her fists clenched as she watched the cub coo as Garnet made faces at it. She watched Rose walk to them and smile one of her radiant smiles as she gently ‘tickled’ the thing. At least that’s what Pearl thought it was called.
“How about Pearl the Second?” Rose suggested.
Garnet had split up over it. Pearl wasn't quite sure why. They'd lost so much, so many lifelong companions, gems with whom they'd shared centuries of history. Friendships that had lasted longer than some human civilizations did. Yet the human’s death after only fifty years of knowing her had been what did it. Ruby and Sapphire didn't even seem to be in disagreement. They both were grieving. They just seemed to want to do so in different ways. Ruby had stormed off into the woods. Sapphire had knelt by Pearl the Second’s final resting place and had just…stopped.
Rose was broken up about it too. More so than usual. Pearl would have thought that, unlike Garnet, she would have grown accustomed to humans dying on her. She'd been experiencing it since before the war, after all.
Pearl had originally expected her to get bored with the concept of human “friendships”, if you could even call them that, after the first handful of deaths, but she'd soon realized that would not be the case. Rose always kept it fresh. It was almost…scientific, the way she approached each human differently. It was like she was trying to solve a puzzle. Pearl suspected that Rose hoped that maybe, if she could understand humans well enough, she’d find something in them that would reveal to her how to fix whatever had been broken within her since before even Pearl had known her. That gnawing ache she hid so well from everyone else, even from Garnet. That nameless thing Pearl could not soothe. Or maybe she'd finally convince herself that all of it was really worth it. That humanity alone was a good enough reason to do what they'd done. It was a funny thought, in an unfunny sort of way.
Pearl the Second had not even been with them during her entire lifespan. They’d raised her there, yes, using an old gem grotto as shelter, since their usual base of operations was too far away, and Rose had not wanted the child to grow up too far apart from her people. And indeed, once she’d grown, Pearl the Second had lived her own life among humans for decades, only visiting the gems on occasion. And yes, she had not been terrible company, and had displayed a level of intellect that had surprised Pearl, but she still had been so human, with her need for food and sleep and all that. Gems were only really vulnerable after their light forms were disrupted enough that they were forced to retreat into their gems, and even then their inactive forms were resilient enough that, barring some massive catastrophe or malicious intent from someone who knew what they were doing, they were essentially safe. But Pearl the Second had needed sleep every night! She’d just lie there, inert, as if waiting for some predator to come steal her away. They’d had to take turns to keep watch. Pearl remembered those nights well, she remembered how peaceful Pearl the Second always seemed despite the severity of her situation. She’d always trusted Pearl implicitly.
Pearl sighed. All those hours of quiet contemplation by the dying embers (temperature, another human need they’d had to adjust to), just for their charge to be taken by some microscopic organism transmitted by a blood-sucking insect.
Her fist found a tree, leaving a deep impression on it. She absently shook the splinters off her hand as she watched Ruby silently return to Sapphire’s side, temper cooled but mood still darkened. Rose still had not left the grotto that day. Pearl shook her head. It was a good thing she was unaffected. Someone had to keep it together.
It was a battlefield. It took Pearl a few seconds to realize. She’d never seen one like this before. A human one. It was the stench that confused her, the invisible cloud of molecules, a byproduct of the processes that caused dead flesh to rot. The other thing she noticed was that the ground was practically untouched. It wouldn’t take long for scavengers big and small to do their job, and then there would be no sign death had ever come to this place. She wondered if perhaps she’d been to other human battlefields before and not known it.
She picked up one of the weapons, a short bronze sword. Bronze. She was trying to be dismissive about it. It was an inferior material, Bismuth wouldn’t have even considered the possibility of using it for weapons. But, despite her best efforts, she was impressed. It seemed only a century ago that humans had begun paying any real attention to metals, and now they were practicing metallurgy? Perhaps they had a future after all. If they managed to channel their ingenuity towards less destructive technologies, at least. She brandished the sword experimentally. It was, she had to admit, good craftsmanship. It even had some personalized touches. Whoever had made this was no ape, no working ant, but a thoughtful, complex creature who wanted their work valued, their skill recognized. Her mind briefly wandered to a young Pearl the Second proudly waving from a tree she’d just climbed. She’d found pride at such small accomplishments silly at the time, though she’d also envied the ability to find such satisfaction so easily.
Without giving it much thought, she stored the sword in her gem, and walked away from the carnage.
One of the humans was dying. Wounded. Bleeding. Pearl had grown accustomed to the sight lately. There was a lot of that going around. The other one, a young thing that could almost be called a child, even by human standards, stood between Pearl and the dying one, sword in hand, ready to fight. His stance was actually not terrible.
“Stay back, creature,” he barked at her, “you will not have him.”
“Creature?” she muttered, paying little attention to the threat. That was new. Humans had always been confused by them, but she had not yet encountered this instinctive hostility. Still, they were in distress, so she supposed she could give them a pass, “listen, I know of a healer nearby, if you-”
She began to approach them, but the man reacted, ready to lunge.
“You will not have him,” he repeated. “I am his pearl. You will have to go through me.”
“His…what, now?” she asked. Gems, being made for interstellar exploration, could naturally acquire languages with ease, but it always took some time to adjust to some concepts that were too foreign to gem culture. In this case, the word was ‘pearl’, but it wasn’t. It was a slightly changed form of a word for Earth pearls from a different language, one probably still spoken not far from there, in a region the gems had been active in only a few centuries earlier. Even there, the language had probably changed significantly by now.
“His pearl! His sworn protector and companion. No harm will come to him so long as I breathe!”
The dying man coughed. Pearl noticed the concern in the…pearl’s eyes as he struggled to decide whether he could afford to tend to his fallen liege.
“What he means to say,” the dying man said, struggling to speak, “is that we are grateful for your offer, but you are wasting your time. I am beyond the help of healers.”
“Not this healer,” she said. She saw it then, the young man’s hesitation.
“Why are you helping us?” he asked, “you don’t even know us. You’re not even human!”
Pearl looked at the shaking bronze in his hands.She looked at the colossal tree the dying man was resting against. Somewhere up there, the damage she had inflicted upon it persisted. Somewhere nearby, covered in vegetation, was a stone marker left by Garnet centuries earlier, inscribed with gem glyphs with a message no human would ever read.
“Someone has to,” she decided.
They watched the young warrior fuss over his liege, partly elated, partly awed by the miraculous recovery.
“You did good, Pearl,” Rose said, placing a hand on her shoulder. Pearl allowed herself to enjoy the words, but shrugged.
“Humans, am I right?” she asked, “where would they be without us?”
Rose hummed.
“Where would we be without them?” she retorted absently. One of those strange things Rose would say that made no sense to Pearl. She told her as much with a look, and Rose chuckled, which of course caused Pearl to smile back at her.
“Probably not a few centuries behind schedule with the clean-up, I’ll tell you that much,” she joked. Really, they should have dismantled the very grotto they were in centuries earlier. But Rose liked to visit.
“We should go,” Rose said quietly as they watched the young pearl’s enthusiasm die down. More and more, humans were beginning to notice how out of place Gem magic was on their world. As much as she enjoyed spending time with humans, Rose did not do well with that kind of attention, with the otherness correctly assigned to them by the locals, especially when it manifested as worship. So these sudden disappearances after flashier displays of power were becoming more common. Pearl had no complaints.
“Yes, let’s,” she agreed, “I was thinking, maybe we can finally get started on the kindergarten?”
She actually felt relief when she realized it wasn’t just in her head: there really was something wrong with Amethyst! She could see it now, clear as day.
There had been an outbreak of some new disease in a nearby settlement, and they had set up camp to help as much as they could. It was horrible. Garnet was out of her depth, but managing. Rose was overwhelmed with emotion, which at least helped bring forth the healing tears. Pearl was doing everything she could to keep the order and get the humans to stick to procedure. And Amethyst, Amethyst was being Amethyst. This was alright. No one expected otherwise from her. She was too new, it had been only a few decades since they’d found her. She was not yet ready to become a steward of the mess other gems had left behind. No, what finally clicked for Pearl was the realization that Amethyst was not Gem enough. There were things missing, things Pearl, Garnet, even Rose had had to unlearn. Not to mention the ease with which she assimilated human behavior. Pearl watched her run around with some of the healthy children, laughing like she was just one more of them. She wondered if she’d ever felt that unburdened. She must have, back in Homeworld.
“Remember, Amethyst, they’re not as resilient as you are!” she called out, suddenly anxious. Amethyst rolled her eyes at her and proceeded to trip on a root and faceplant. The children surrounded her, curious. If it had happened to any of them, they would have been crying by now. But Amethyst leapt up, a bright grin on her face, and the children cheered.
Pearl turned away and returned to her duties, checking on the convalescent humans assigned to her. The majority were children. She did not love this, but there was no choice, Rose was too busy with the actual healing and Garnet would be more useful if she was not distracted by whatever inner turmoil human children caused in her lately.
“You, your bowl is still full,” she said to one of her charges, “You need to stay hydrated. That means drink water,” she clarified as she saw the child’s confused look. “And you,” she turned to another one, “what did you DO with your hands, you are supposed to stay clean, look at this,” she grabbed the child’s wrist and showed her hand to her, “Your nasal fluids and dirt! Please wipe with the assigned cloth and do not touch the dirt- HEY!” she interrupted herself as she saw a coughing child, “hey! Antecubital fossa! Cough into your antecubi- THIS THING!”
Something tugged at her leg. She looked down and saw one of the children looking up at her, hair wild, eyes pleading.
“...Yes?” she asked, unsure of what to expect. The child took a step back and showed her a wooden sword they were holding. Her first thought was that children should not have swords. Her second thought was that that tiny hand was holding on far too tightly to the hilt. She remembered a tree, and a dying man, and fear in the eyes of youth. Cautious, she knelt to meet the child at their level and smiled.
“I’m not sure you’re supposed to have that,” she said softly. The child brandished the sword with terrible form, “then again, wood is not exactly optimal material for a weapon like this. Not to mention the rate of degradation. Though I suppose that would not be much concern for humans.”
The child blinked at her, silent. They stepped back and brandished the weapon again. Pearl could not help but click her tongue at the poor display of technique.
“Honestly, I’m not sure why a wooden sword was even considered, with better alternatives available. And it’s clearly sized for a child your size, and you are useless in battle, no offense. Oh! Oh I see. It’s an easily-produced, less-lethal training weapon! Oh, that is very clever, really. Humans!” she said, and was surprised to hear the joy in her last word. She reminded herself of Rose, which was a strange thought to have.
Amethyst ran past them, chasing another child, then backtracked to look at the child and the wooden sword in their hand.
“Oh hey, cool toy,” she said, before returning to her game.
“Oh,” Pearl said, “a toy. Yes. I suppose that is also a viable use for it.”
The child smiled, wide and slightly unsettling.
“You want to play,” Pearl finally realized. The child silently gestured that was right and once again slashed the sword through the air.
“Hmm,” Pearl considered, looking around at her charges. Amethyst was kneeling next to one of them.
“Here, we can share,” she was saying, leading a bowl to the boy’s lips, “you drink the water, I’ll eat the bowl.”
Pearl watched in awe as the child drank his first sip of water of the day. She shook her head in disbelief at the mysteries of the human mind. Had she not explained to him repeatedly that he needed to stay hydrated?
“You know what?” she decided, picking an old bronze sword from her collection and bringing it forth from her gem, “I think I can spare a minute or two for a sparring match.”
The child before her immediately lunged forward, clumsy but savage. Pearl hurried into a defensive position and parried their strikes.
“Not here!” she said, “I didn’t mean in the middle of all the sick people!”
She was trying to come up with a plan to get them to stop without harming them when someone came up from behind her and rushed to pick up the child.
“There’s my little knight,” the woman said, holding the child to her chest as they waved their arms fiercely at Pearl.
Knight. She knew that word by now. There was barely any remnant left in it of the original term she’d heard long ago under that damaged tree.
“A knight, huh?” She asked fondly, putting her sword away, “are you their mother?”
“Yes. Sorry for the trouble, I’m afraid it’s all my fault. Pearl loves knight stories before bed and I need my sleep, so I always give in.”
“Their name is…Pearl?” Pearl asked, tilting her head at the child, who was now absently chewing on their mother’s arm, “Is that a common name among your people?”
“Not too common, but not unique. It’s supposed to mean something like ‘kind companion’, but who knows?”
Pearl hummed. She knew humans could be…like that with their names, that they often just picked things that sounded nice and held no meanings. She understood, in broad strokes, at least, how names worked by now. But there was something uncomfortable about a word that had once meant her gem being used as a name like that. The child didn’t seem like a pearl, or like a knight, or like Pearl the Second. Nothing like Pearl the Second. It angered her somewhat, that there was another human with the name.
“Are you alright?” the mother asked.
“Me? Oh I’m fine,” Pearl said dismissively, “it’s just, I used to know someone with that name. A long time ago.”
“Oh,” the woman said, surprised by this, “is that why you asked? Is it a common name among…your people?”
“Something like that,” Pearl said, amused by the hesitance. It could make humans uncomfortable, to think of them as people. The woman looked down at the child, unsure of what to make of this connection between them and an otherworldly race she could not hope to understand. Pearl considered explaining she’d been thinking of a different human, but decided against it. No, she did not decide. She simply didn’t.
“It meant something else for us,” she found herself explaining, “the name of a gemstone. Like this one,” she added, pointing to her forehead. The woman looked at the gem, pretending she’d only just now noticed it. It was a strange version of kindness some humans liked to pay them.
“Oh. I supposed that makes sense,” she said, “I do often call Pearl here my treasure.”
Pearl smiled, awkward, uncomfortable. She knew the woman meant it in a good way. Metaphor. She valued the child’s life, probably even more than her own, from what Pearl knew of humans. For humans, treasure could be many things. But she could not help the bitter feelings bubbling inside her, the cruel reminder of the time when she’d been trophy, status symbol, collectible. A treasure like many others. Had she really not noticed, back then?
She found herself looking at Rose, and Rose met her eyes with a sad, teary, exhausted smile. Instantly she felt the bitterness evaporate.
“Your treasure seems to be doing very well,” Pearl said, regaining her composure, “maybe they could play away from the sick children?”
“I- Yes, of course!” The mother said, bowing apologetically as she backed away, “We didn’t mean any- I’ll see to it!”
She turned and hurried to leave. Pearl frowned. She hadn’t been that cold, had she? Humans were still difficult. The child Pearl watched her over their mother’s shoulder. Pearl raised an eyebrow at them, and they replied with a cheerful smile and a wave. Pearl waved back, and found herself smiling back. So, the little rebel had manners, at least. Perhaps the name did suit them, after all.
It was over. They were lying on the ground, their four heads almost touching, watching the stars. Resting. They were fine, physically. But their minds had been begging for this moment of respite. Not far from them was an ancient stone marking, weathered beyond recognition.
“You did well today, Amethyst,” Garnet said.
“”Wuh?” Amethyst said.
“Didn’t she?” Rose agreed cheerfully, “I’m very proud of you, Amethyst.”
“Are you guys messing with me?” Amethyst asked. She actually sounded slightly wounded.
“You kept the children entertained, mostly away from the areas they were supposed to avoid, and you even helped a few sick people,” Pearl reminded her, “not bad for your first time, I suppose.”
Amethyst didn’t say anything.
“I’m terrible with children,” Garnet lamented.
“It’s not exactly our job to be babysitters,” Pearl reminded her.
“It might be some day,” Garnet said. Pearl frowned. What was that supposed to mean?
“I thought we agreed we wouldn’t-”
She cut herself off. She supposed they hadn’t agreed. Not out loud. They’d all silently come to the understanding that one time had been enough.
“Agreed we wouldn’t what?” Amethyst asked, confused.
“Nothing,” Garnet said.
“Nevermind,” Pearl said at the same time.
“But aren’t they fascinating?” Rose asked, clearly changing the subject in that way she did, where not even Pearl could tell how intentional it was, “how they grow? How sometimes they’re just like their parents, and sometimes not at all? And sometimes both!”
“Hmmm,” Garnet said.
“They’re fun,” Amethyst said, “They haven’t learned the bad stuff yet.”
Pearl thought of a battlefield, but also of a young, brave knight, and of Pearl the Second.
“They haven’t learned some good stuff, either,” she mused.
“But they learn so fast!” Rose said, “One day they can barely walk and the next day they’re climbing up a tree!”
“It took her more than a day,” Pearl said automatically, “it was at least a few years.”
“What?” Amethyst asked.
“Pearl is just thinking of an old friend,” Rose said casually.
“She would have loved you,” Garnet said.
“Oh,” Amethyst said slowly, “I don’t like that. About humans. When they go away.”
They were silent for a moment.
“A lot of them went away back there,” Amethyst added.
“Less than if we hadn’t been there,” Garnet said.
“We did our best,” Pearl reassured her.
Rose hummed, uncertain. Thankfully, Amethyst did not seem to notice.
“Did I really do a good job?” she asked.
Pearl patted her head instinctively, something she hadn’t done for anyone in a long, long time.
“You did,” she said.
“It’s not what I was made for,” Amethyst said. She rarely talked about that. Gems emerged with that innate knowledge, but Amethyst, well, she wasn’t like most other gems, and that was without taking into account how she’d emerged to an empty kindergarten, or how she’d spent hundreds of years alone, with no other quartzes or authorities to reinforce that innate knowledge, “it feels weird, sometimes.”
“Us too,” Garnet said. Rose didn’t say anything, of course, “but it’s good weird, right?”
“Very good,” Amethyst agreed, cheer returning to her voice, “I like it, doing things I wasn’t made for.”
“It certainly comes very easily to you,” Pearl said, half jab, half compliment.
“Oh,” Amethyst said, as if she’d just realized something. “Did it bother you? What that woman said, about pearls being treasures?”
Rose gasped.
“You heard?” Pearl asked, mostly to buy time. Was it wrong that she got some satisfaction from that reaction from Rose?
“Sorry,” Amethyst said.
“It was hardly a private conversation,” Pearl reassured her. “And no, it didn’t. All earth gems are seen that way by humans. She would also have said that about a ruby, or an emerald, or even a diamond. Besides, it’s not like I wish I was something else.”
Amethyst didn’t ask the question, very loudly.
“You are strong, and fast, and tough,” Pearl explained, “because you’re a quartz. Because that’s what was needed for a soldier. But you use it in your own way. You made it your own.”
“I guess,” Amethyst said.
“I’m the same way. I’m a Pearl. And that means many things. And some of those things come from Homeworld. But mostly, it means what I make it mean.”
“Weird?” Amethyst joked.
Pearl sighed.
“Rookies used to respect me,” she complained, “Even you used to be afraid of me, Garnet.”
“Yes. Then I met you,” Garnet pointed out.
Rose chuckled.
“I still think you’re terrifying, if that helps” she said.
Pearl closed her eyes and smiled.
“No, you don’t,” she said. But that was okay. The war was over. The real fight was behind them. She was many things, but some she could leave behind. Rose, Garnet and Amethyst had each met a different Pearl, and of the three, Pearl knew she liked this one best. Hopefully she would like the next one even more.
“Here,” Pearl declared. Steven rushed to her and stood right in front of her, the tip of his toes almost touching hers.
“Here?” He asked, pointing to the ground right below them. Pearl rolled her eyes fondly.
“It doesn’t have to be exactly here,” she said. Just…any spot you can see. Wherever you like.”
“Hmmm,” Steven said, taking the assignment far too seriously. Finally, he decided on a spot under the shadow of a nearby tree.
“Here!” he said.
“Well, what are you waiting for?” she asked. He giggled and took off his hamburger backpack.
“Um, Pearl?” he asked as he began setting up the blanket and unpacking the food, “what are we doing here?”
“We’re having a picnic, like you asked,” she reminded him, “well, you are. I’m watching you.”
Steven laughed.
“I know that. I meant, why here?”
Pearl looked around. There was no damaged tree, no stone marking, not even the grotto. But this was the place.
“Well,” she said, “I thought I might use the opportunity to tell you about Pearl.”