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Smokey Quartz was, as was now clearly her pattern, sleeping at her desk, eyes glassed over in mental exhaustion, crumpled sheets of paper surrounding her, and a line of drool leaking from her mouth as her head pointed up at the ceiling; after almost any of her writing or planning sessions Smokey would remain like this four hours, and other then the occasional twitch she would remain utterly motionless. Pink Pearl hadn’t been sure what to do at first. She didn’t want to disturb her mistress but she was also concerned, eventually Smokey had simply told Pink Pearl that it was nothing, and to treat her like a piece of furniture when she was like that; move her, clean around her, set her back up. Which is exactly what Pink was doing, Smokey didn’t even notice the vacuum being used as Pink re-ordered the room, putting books away, refiling the inkwell and capping it, putting the crumpled up papers that littered the ground around the desk into the trash, organizing the mess that was the desk itself. Normally this is where Pink would leave things. The room was tidy again, and Smokey was doing her ‘not sleeping’ thing.

Normaly this is where Pink would leave things. Normaly. But Smokey had been doing this to herself every day this week. She’d wake up, have Tea once or twice with Pink, complement her on it, make small talk, and go right back to her office where she’d write and crumple up papers and end up in this same state every time. Smokey had never mentioned what she was working on so feverantly, and Pink knew that, as a pearl, it wasn’t her place to ask. Of course, that didn’t stop her from being a little curious. It was rude to intrude she reminded herself again, but it was also her place to help serve her mistress to the best of her ability’s so maybe a tinny peek wouldn’t hurt anything? Pink paused, she was hesitant, she wasn’t a defect, but she remembered what Smokey had said, Her pearls needed to be smarter than the rest, they couldn’t always wait around for her to order them to do something because she had more important things to do then micro-manage. It wasn’t as though she was going to DO anything her mistress didn’t already imply she should do just…. Read some papers on a desk.

Her mind made up Pink finished cleaning the room, which consisted of dapping the drool off Smokey’s cheek and closing her mouth enough se wouldn’t drool on herself any more then she already had. Pink then turned to the papers on the desk. ‘I’ll need to read them to properly organize them’ she told herself. The first sheet had a name, White Azezulite, and an arrow pointing to a second name Black Azezulite fallowed by a question mark, beneath the names was a simple almost featureless drawing of a gem, a circle over her left breast with an arrow pointing towards a circle over the right breast and a note ‘Symbolic?’ all along the sides of the drawing were point form notes. ‘No Emotions at all?’ ‘Power inversion.’ ‘Memories intact’ ‘simple cloths, why?’ and so forth and so on. Honestly, the names and all the notes meant nothing to Pink, moving on to the next page were more notes, although it was a bit more detailed then the previous page.

Problem:
Transmutation? From White Azezulite to Black Azezulite, Gemstone changed as well.

Things that could cause Transmutation:
Fusion: With who? And for this long?

Internal damage \
Latent Defect -----------> Rose’s Tears could fix these!
Internal Engraving /

Problem: Rose turned herself into that hybrid. Killing it might bring Rose back, but she won’t help me if I do that. Tears out of reach for the next 100+ years at best.
Psychological? Az didn’t get attacked when the change happened.

Problem: who’d bother giving her treatment? Home world likes her like this

How to fix? Fusion? Need to Fuse to find out. Az won’t fuse with me. Fusion can’t be forced….

I am going to have to kill Az

Other pages were similar albeit far more detailed, one page was devoted entirely to the idea of killing Steven in a ploy to bring rose back just to gain access to her tears, this page ended with comments about not ending one innocent life to save another and that Rose would never forgive Smokey for doing something like that. Several other pages were dedicated to the idea of using fusion on ‘Az’. Many of the plans were rather detailed and elaborate including everything from creating a situation that would force someone who didn’t trust her to fuse with Smokey, to exactly what she may encounter in a broken mindscape, how to take command of that mental landscape, and how to fix almost any imaginable problem one might find. Of course all of these pages ended with the comment “She will never Fuse with me. Not Now.” A few of the pages on fusion however seemed to acknowledge this fact and outlined what someone else could do, and how they’d need to do it. There were even plans for finding and grooming someone to be the type of person ‘Az’ would fuse with to trick her into letting them inside her mind. Another page detailed the appearance of an orange and gold gem that was traveling with ‘Az’ now, and how to convince them to go along with the plan, but notes at the end discouraged this stating ‘No way to communicate without Az suspecting me’

Pink Pearl could admit, she did not know who ‘Az’ was, not really, just a random gem as far as she knew. But if all Smokey Quartz needed was someone else to fuse with ‘Az’ and she just didn’t know anyone, well Pink knew plenty of gems. Specifically she knew an ‘orange and gold armored gem’ called Spessarite, and having never seen or met this ‘Az’ before she could easily convey messages without revealing who she was working for. Pink Pearl smiled to herself as she finished cleaning the desk and went to make some tea for when Smokey woke up. ‘Honestly, if my mistress just told me things like this it would have saved her so much trouble. I’m a pearl I was made to serve’ she thought to herself proudly as she began figuring out how to bring up her knowledge to Smokey Quartz in the politest way possible.

When Smokey woke from her torpor she made her usual trip to the dining room, a rather well furnished cavern chamber with an oil lit brass chandelier, a restored seventeen hundreds cheery oak dining table and matching chairs, a gem tech based ‘oven stove’ which Pink Pearl used to make Smokey her tea, and flowers. Sitting in the center of the table was a vase of lily’s that grew naturally on the island, on carved stone shelves cut into the walls were pots of varying other local flora, daffodils, carnations, lilacs and so forth, while strung up along the walls were various flowering vines, that all combined to give the chamber a greenhouse-esc sort of feeling. As per her custom upon waking Smokey lurched towards the table and took a seat, waiting patiently for Pink to serve her some tea. Pearl had known a few gems in her time, but few were as anti-social when they first woke up as Smokey was. Before she had her first cup she was at best a mute shell of herself waiting for energy to fill her. At worst, she was unbearably contactors, and sarcastic. But once she had that first critical cup of something she was back to the endlessly patient gem that adopted Pink. So she waited until her mistress had downed that first cup before saying anything.

“hmmm. Delicious” Smokey said as she savored every drop of the dark liquid. “a second cup if you would be so kind” she politely asked after she finished the first, to which Pink refiled the cup and took a seat across from Smokey and poured herself a cup as well. Unlike Smokey she wasn’t as great a fan of tea and had to add a few drops of honey to sweeten it “So my dear, have you put much thought into a personal name yet?” Smokey asked politely, it was honestly only the second time she had asked, clearly not wanting to pressure Pink Pearl over it.

Pink blushed and hid her face behind her cup as she sipped at the contents, Smokey’s usual morning chit-chat wasn’t so serious, then again, it had been over a week since the last time she asked…. Slowly putting her cup down Pink nodded, still blushing at the idea. “Rose” she practically whispered. She had noticed that Smokey’s pearls tended to name themselves in accordance with their colours, her Black Pearl was Noir, and her Red Pearl was Scarlet. Honestly, Pink had thought about insisting that ‘Pink Pearl’ was good enough and that just ‘Pink’ would suffice, but she didn’t want to object to what was a flattering request, Smokey wanted pink to have a special name because she considered her to be better than all the other Pink Pearls out there; which made it extraordinarily difficult to refuse the request to name herself. Of course this left Pink with the problem of having to come up with a name that she felt would go nicely with the naming theme of her predecessors, not a lot of names jumped out when she considered her colour, if she’d been a white pearl she’d have simply gone with ivory, a black pearl could get away with ebony, honestly the only colour that would be as bad off as she was would have been a Gold Pearl. Pink had considered the name Rose the longest, she liked it, it was nice, soft sounding, and had an air of sophistication. Of course her fear was that because Rose was also the name of Rose Quartz Smokey would refuse it, Pink had a few fall backs, but nothing jumped out of her mind like Rose had.

Smokey smiled from across the table “That’s a lovely name Rose” she said softly completely erasing all of Pink, or rather Rose’s fears over her name. she really needed to remember that Smokey wasn’t at all like Pink Opal, Rose hadn’t known her long enough to judge but she doubted anything could actually shake her new mistress. “So, while I’ve been cooped up in my study, what have you been up to? Explore the island any further?” she asked with a smirk.

Pink blushed a bit, Smokey had a tendency to work for long stints without rest, hardly leaving her study at all. However she made sure that Rose would spend at least some time outside doing something, it was why the kitchen was as decorated in flora as it was. On the few occasions where Smokey admitted she needed a rest she would go out with Rose and enjoy the flower field in the center of the island. Truth be told however, Rose hadn’t gone out yesterday, or done anything for herself for that matter, something that would typically earn her a light scolding from Smokey who would then drag her outside and take them both on a long nature hike around the island, and possibly on the warp-pad to some far flung location somewhere. Thankfully Rose had a way out of any potential scolding and forced relaxation today “actually, when I was cleaning your office I couldn’t help but read some of the papers you were working on” Rose said shyly hoping that Smokey would not notice the abrupt change of subjects.

What Rose saw was not at all what she expected; Smokey tensed up slightly, her lips pressed as she nodded slowly “Ah….. Those” her voice was heavy and she sounded very much like a gem who had just been caught red handed doing something she shouldn’t be. “It’s nothing for you to worry about….. I, I know what I have to do. I’m just…. Procrastinating” she said in a very controlled and neutral voice that was clearly meant to hide and obscure any and all emotions.

This change in her mistress’s attitude at the mere mention of her work set off alarm bells for Rose. Smokey clearly had come to the conclusion that she had to kill this ‘Az’ because she had no other viable plan, and she was intentionally delaying it as much as she could. Rose opened her mouth and hoped she wasn’t about to put her foot there as she spoke her mind “Well, when I was reading, I noticed you wanted to find some way to talk to Spessarite, and I thought I might be able to act as a go-between for you” she said with far less confidence then she had intended

Smokey raised an eyebrow “Spessarite?” she asked slightly confused

Rose nodded “The orange gem with golden armor” she explained. As soon as the words left her mouth Smokey had turned into a cloud of vapor which was rushing as much as any cloud could rush towards Rose, it then turned back into Smokey Quartz who grabbed the still shocked pearl out of her seat and hugged her so tightly that, if she were human, she’d be feeling things crack

“ROSE!” she exclaimed then holding the pearl up by the shoulders brought her forwards and kissed her “You might have just solved all my problems!” Smokey practically shouted, the largest smile Rose had ever seen painted on the usually controlled face of her mistress. Smokey set Rose down and dusted her off before flattening her own trench coat. “Now, I assume you have some sort of a plan. Black Azezulite is very dangerous and if she thinks you are my pearl, well, at best it simply won’t end well for you”

Rose nodded “I’ve never met her, and everyone else who knows me either thinks I am Pink Opals pearl, or that I am still trying to find a good master, so….. I just won’t mention I’m yours” she said, rubbing her left shoulder a bit. Smokey’s hugs were a bit tight she noted, not painful but tight.

Smokey nodded “and this Spessarite, you think she’ll listen to you?”

Rose nodded “She fought with Sunstone and Pink Opal to keep Bloodstone in check for the last several thousand years” Rose’s voice was particularly cold at that comment.

“I thought you said you’d never seen fighting before your fusion with Pink Opal” Smokey asked, eyebrow raised

“I didn’t” was all Rose said. And it’s all she needed to say as Smokey nodded understanding her meaning all to well. To think some one would just leave a pearl like this alone for so long and then abandon her when she became ‘inconvenient’ filled Smokey with her ususal quite rage, something she latched onto and bottled for later.

“well…. I suppose your going to want to know about Azezulite” Smokey said in a sullen tone as she walked back to her seat “get comfortable my precious Rose, this is a… painful story for me to repeat. I’m a bit of a perfectionist, and I don’t like making mistakes, especially one’s that hurt others more than myself”

As Rose took up her seat and started to listen Smokey began her story “I’ve been around for a while Rose, so, it stands to reason I’ve made my fair share of mistakes, I’d like to think I made less than my share to be honest. I’m sure most gem’s think the same” Smokey sipped her tea “Azezulite however stands apart and above most of those errors in judgment. To start with, she was originally White Azezulite, she and I came from the same mineral vain as well, although I came from far deeper in the ground. In my time I learned of what organics call ‘family’ and, by an approximate definition, White Azezulite, Az, would be my sister. We emerged not to far apart in either space or time, only about thousand years, and a few hundred or so clicks. Now, I’m a strategist, tactician, and warrior. For me, the ways of destroying one’s enemy through military conflict come rather naturally. I won’t bore you with the details, but you can assume that I am like most quartz as far as military histories are concerned. That being said, Azezulite was quite my opposite. She disliked violence, she hated seeing anyone hurt, or hearing about people dying. I suppose it was because of her nature in this regard that she held the positon she did. Az oversaw the kinder garden on her world, she taught newly emerged gems about gem society, and culture, taught them how to fuse, and how to summon their weapon to protect themselves, even coached them through discovering and mastering their unique ability’s” Smokey sipped some more of her tea, watching Rose carefully as she did.

“Now, when Rose Quartz started her rebellion on earth, it sent shockwaves across the empire. I did not agree with all or even most of her reasons at the time. But I did agree that it was time for our society to change, by force if necessary. As you know, I am a cautious person. I do not rush head long into things, so I waited. And I carefully thought through my own positon before committing myself, by which point I had my choice of worlds to rebel upon. I discarded worlds where the rebellion was sure to succeed as it did not serve my pruposes, and I also ignored the worlds where rebellion would be crushed, no point fighting a battle that’s already lost. Even sticking to the worlds where a few key players would shift the balance there were plenty of options…….. Out of….. I’m honestly not sure if it was pride, arrogance, love, or just sentimentality, I chose the world Azezulite was on, where she ran the kinder garden” Smokey looked down at her tea “at the time, I told myself it was the logical choice. She was my ‘sister’ my closest friend, ally, and supporter. Her world was one that the rebels were unlikely to take, so, my appearance there, my turning the kinder garden overseer to my side, and in turn taking the world for the rebellion would cement my status as a great leader.” Smokey let out a heavy sigh “It honestly came as no suppose that Az wanted nothing to do with the rebellion, in fact she was so opposed to the concept that she refused to take up sides. She really did try to stay neutral, and it was working to. Gems on both sides were raised by her and they respected her enough not to push the mater…. But I wanted my sure thing, no, I wanted Az on my side, I wanted her to say I was right. So I kept trying to force her hand” Smokey looked towards a collection of plants sitting on the shelves, she looked like she was about to say something before she caught herself and carried on with the tale “I kept telling her she couldn’t be neutral on this. That she had to pick a side, that not fighting was doing more damage than actually fighting. Well” Smokey folded her hands together “eventually it was too much, she couldn’t stand the strain of watching gems kill each other, and I imagine my arguments only made things worse. I wasn’t there when it happened, but she self-transmuted, from White Azezulite, to Black Azezulite, but so unlike any normal Black Azezulite, she had stripped out all of her emotions, and ability to feel. She was just a thing of logic and calculation. I spent a long time trying to figure out exactly what happened to her Rose. Transmutation outside of fusion is so rare that it’s almost undocumented, typically, the resulting transformation is considered an improvement, other times the result is, essentially, what you see with corrupted gems.” Smokey finished her story and began sipping at her tea which had grown cold by now

Rose blinked. Then she blinked again. Her mind was processing everything Smokey had told her, but very slowly, it kept getting stuck on the ‘transmutation’ part of things. How did a gem lock away their emotions. Even if they did that, how did a gem just…… become another kind of gem, similar or not. Why would a gem ever even do that anyway? Sure her feelings were hurt when Pink Opal abandoned her but even then, at her absolute worst she couldn’t imagine just…. Not feeling, and deciding to not feel anything ever again. It was heart breaking, and the fact that Smokey had caused that, and held herself accountable for it? Rose felt terrible for her mistress. She couldn’t imagine what it must have been like to lose someone close to her in such a way, she wasn’t all that familiar with what a ‘sister’ was but if it was even slightly like her relationship with Pink Opal, Smokey must have felt like she was being torn apart from the inside out from the moment it happened until well… the pain didn’t really stop for Rose until Smokey had taken her in, so maybe she was still hurting just the same as the day it happened. But the story also made Rose irritated. She wasn’t sure why but something about it all ticked a nerve and just bothered her. Not angry or stand up and shout, and not internal horror, fear or dread, but something else. Something just… scratched in the back of her mind and irritated her.

Smokey folded her hands in front of her after she finished her tea “Now then, with that out of the way, I won’t be having you carrier messages back and forth until after I have everything else in order. Namely, I need to find us both bait, and an ideal location” she continued

Rose blinked, the sudden chance in Smokey’s tone from solemn and sullen to business as usual was somewhat jarring to behold. “Bait? Location?” Rose asked a bit confused

Smokey smiled “Yes, we need bait, something or someone that Azezulite would consider enough of a threat to warrant using fusion against, a corrupted gem or a particularly dangerous combatant would be ideal. I’d use myself but she knows that unless I have a plan in motion I tend to run, and if I don’t well, she’ll know something’s up and will herself retreat. So she needs a valid threat that’s not me” Smokey waved her hand in the air absently before carrying on “as for location, I need to lure her some place where retreat is a less viable option then staying and fighting it out with whatever monster I set her up against. A cave system, canyon, enclosed building, or something similar would be ideal, failing that somewhere removed from a warp pad so that if she were to try retreat, she’d have to out run her enemy for some time”

Rose processed the information. It made senses when she thought about it, if you could avoid an unnecessary fight, why bother with the fight at all? Which meant her mistress needed to make this into something where Azezulite felt she needed to fight all out, but if she was setting something like that up…. “But if you do all that, doesn’t that mean you’ll be putting Azezulite and Spessarite’s lives at risk?” she asked as the thought entered her mind

Smokey nodded “sadly, that’s unavoidable. The danger needs to be real. That’s not to say I won’t be waiting in the wings to step in and stop my own plans if things go horribly awry”

This brought another thought to the front of Rose’s mind “but, if it’s something dangerous enough to make Azezulite and Spessarite fuse, won’t it be to strong for you to beat on your own?”

To that Smokey smiled, it was an odd thing, a slight curling at the corners of her lips, a pulling at the sides of her eyes. “Despite what Black Azezulite might like to believe, she is not a warrior and is still very much White Azezulite at heart. I grant that she is clever, can’t be intimidated as she literally dose not experience fear, and has improved her skills from what they were to start with, but, ultimately, she is still White Azezulite, a gem who so greatly disliked violence, her combat training began and ended with the basic’s taught to all gems before they were handed off to varying specialists. Backing her into a corner has never been a significant problem for me in the past. I just never had the means to finish my plans before now” she said in a very…. Controlled and tightened voice, one that was clearly experienced at holding back and restraining emotions, although some still slipped through, like her excitement and her bitterness at having not been able to correct this mistake any sooner. “Now, Rose, I am going to head out and find us some bait and a suitable location, while I’m out, you figure out the safest way for you to approach this Spessarite” With that Smokey stood up and headed out of the cavern to the islands warp pad.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Smokey had scouted a few possible locations to set up her trap. The best she’d seen by far was a mountain top, it would take Az and ‘Spessarite’ some time to scale with no quite route back to the warp pad, the large open environment would also not hinder their fusion any with it’s high mobility and powerful ranged weapon. Now all she needed was to find some ‘bait’ sadly the mountain had already been cleared of obstacles, all the local corruptions were either dead or to small to pose a threat. The crystal gems had clearly been very busy gems in the last four thousand years as it was rather difficult to find corruptions at all, let alone powerful one’s that would pose enough of a threat to Azezulite to force her to fuse.

At this point Smokey was walking through one of earths many forests hoping to find something nasty, although her expectations were rather low. That’s when she noticed something. Overcast cloudy sky, heavy fog, and encroaching shadows. Unfortunately her skin was not feeling moist from the fog, and her black hair was still warm from the sun, which meant this was all an illusion. Smokey smiled. She hated illusionists so damn much, this was perfect. Either a corruption or a gem capable of making illusions was in the area and had marked Smokey as their target. As she continued to walk observing everything around her and comparing it to what her other senses said. This was a gem she reasoned. A corruption wouldn’t bother with ‘atmosphere’ like this. Smokey summoned up her halberd and half closed her eyes. Illusions like this meant the gem could make herself invisible, which is what a corruption would have done. Smokey inhaled the air; it was dry, which did not fit with the fog at all, although she did now feel moister on her skin. Two senses at once, not bad. ‘From behind or beside’ she asked herself as she stood still and waited. Side she realized as she pivoted in place avoiding an incoming bolt of energy, she then looked in the direction of the blast. Her target was invisible still. ‘Smart’ she thought, although that wasn’t going to help them any, now that Smokey had a rough idea of their positon she walked in the general direction swinging her halberd lazily in wide arc’s in front of her. The halberd was a terrible weapon for a one on one melee, however, its reach meant that as a search tool it worked wonders, all she needed was for the little witch to get freaked out by the pole arm swinging wildly and make a move. Oh, there it was, Smokey smirked as she heard leaves crunch, her eyes looking down and tracking the motions of the broken twigs and cracking foliage. As Smokey pursued the invisible gem another scent caught her attention, metallic, iron if she had to guess, along with a bit of organic rot. Blood and gore then, so this gem liked to go around killing the locals but wasn’t a corruption. Sociopath or psychopath became the only question in Smokey’s mind as she pursued her quarry.

She had made a clear miscalculation Labradorite thought to herself. This gem was not intimidated by the weather, and she anticipated the attack. Normally this wouldn’t be enough to make Lab run, but it had been a very long time since she had actually stalked another gem, let alone one that was clearly of the warrior cast rather than some lost noble or their servant. Warriors were harder to deal with, they didn’t scare easy, they had sharp senses, and if they caught her, well Lab fancied herself a bit of a sorceress, and the wizard never fared well against someone with a big sharp stick of they got in close. No she’d need to fall back, re-evaluate, and chip away at this gem. She just needed to figure out what they feared. Everyone had a personal nightmare, and Labradorite specialized in finding it and bringing that to the surface. The only problem was, with a gem she’d need to make physical contact, ideally with their gem. And a cursory examination of the strange grey woman revealed that hers was concealed, probably under that trench coat she wore, or beneath those gloves on her hands. Probably the hands since she didn’t reach any ware to summon up that nasty looking halberd.

As Smokey paced towards Labrodite who was gaining distance on her she kept her eyes low. They weren’t trustworthy, but they were good at confirming the source of the sounds each time they spotted the foliage on the ground get crushed, so many gems made the mistake of trusting their eyes and looking around when they fought illusionists, when the trick was to distrust all the senses, particularly the eyes unless you could cross verify them somehow, and by the stars, look at the ground! Most illusionists that made themselves invisible forgot that their foot prints weren’t, and so rarely if ever created illusions to hide their tracks. As she kept advancing Smokey wondered when the last time this gem had encountered another of her species had been, prolonged isolation could honestly have caused her to just assume anything humanoid is hostile, and she might honestly not remember how to tell a gem from a human anymore, or even what she is if it had been long enough without anyone to talk to.

With more than a good lead on Smokey Labradorite appraised her. Tall, weapon drawn, no visible gem, eyes downcast, but a loss and easy walk. The tall grey gem did not consider her to be a threat Labradorite realized. So long as she was smart about it, getting in for that fatal touch wouldn’t be to hard, the gem wasn’t really looking around for her, just listening, and well, Lab wasn’t one to boast, oh who was she kidding, she loved boasting. She was a master illusionist, Sight, Sound, Touch. She could create illusions so real people died of fear. And once she physically touched some one? Then the REAL fun began as she transformed their world into a waking nightmare from which there was no escape, save the sweet release of death which Lab delighted in withholding while she took in their terror like a fine wine, and the best flavors came from those who seemed so courageous.

Smokey stopped walking and began looking around. The forest had gone completely silent. Looking from tree to tree she saw birds in the upper branches and insects buzzing in the distance, but there was no sound. So, this gem had figured her out, not a surprise really, some human had to have caught on and tried the same trick before her, they couldn’t be that stupid. Still, anticipating where the danger would come from just got a whole lot harder now. And if the illusionist had gotten particularly serious most of Smokey’s defensive tricks were probably out the window. So, new plan. Smokey was old, and experienced, she’d fought more xenoforms with more varied and unique abilities then most gems, and that had taught her solutions to interesting problems. Like what do you do when your enemy is invisible, and inaudible? Why, you did nothing of course. And that’s what Smokey did, she stood there still as could be and waited for the illusionist to strike.

Labradorite was adamantly confused at what she was seeing. The grey Noir reject was just standing there like a bump on a log. Now, Lab wasn’t stupid, she knew what was probably going through the gems head, ‘where is the invisible enemy? Why can’t I hear anything? This is a trap, what’s the safest move?” it was a fear of a sort Lab supposed, but honestly it was as boring and tasteless as cardboard. So, while the giant dope stood there like an idiot trying to think of a way out of this Labradorite carefully approached from behind. She had no idea where the woman’s gem was, so she’d have to make due with indirect contact and hope her enchantments were more effective on gems then she remembered. Hand outstretched she touched the grey woman in the center of her back, the second it took her to turn and strike at where Labradorite was had been enough.

Smokey felt a hand touch her, and on reflex she span around, feeling the hand move with her as the gem it belonged to evaded the axe head of Smokey’s halberd, not a hard feat this close though. As the hand left her back the world around Smokey changed, she was not in the forest any more, she was on a now long since dead world, and she was surrounded by giant misshapen creatures of flesh and steel armed with massive cannons on their backs, while in front of them stood equally mangled alien cyborgs, their cybernetics hastily implanted as their world died. This was the last stand of a doomed race. Smokey recognized everything she saw, most of the details were how she remembered them, but a few things had changed for the worse, her forces were fewer, all that remained were wounded and barley able to stand let alone fight, and Scarlet looked to be on her last legs. Smokey scowled. Scarlets death was one of the most painful moments in her life, but she did not die here, at this point in her life Gold Pearl was her pearl, and she’d never dare come to the front lines. It was tiny details like that which lead Smokey to understand what was going on. This wasn’t a memory re-creation, it was a mental simulation of her greatest fears, and at her age, Smokey had lived through everything that she feared. Had she been younger, perhaps only a quarter of her age, this vision would terrify her and she’d treat it as real. But she knew better, she knew she was on the planet earth, in a forest filled with trees not on a barren world in a box canyon, she knew her failings, she accepted them and moved on. That’s what she told herself when Black Azezulite marched forward, a disfigured half corrupted mockery of White Azezulite. Her form was distorted, her face was a broken and stitched together porcelain mask made to resemble White Az’s face, behind the cracks Smokey could see squirming tentacles and tiny mouths. Azezulites left arm was awkwardly fused to a giant cannon, her flesh stretched around it as cables bore into her body for stability, her right arm ended in a long cybernetic blade that had somehow been welded to her flesh. Her legs were reverse joined and elongated like an ostriches, only her torso seemed relatively unmarred, save for the gem of course, which was broken and leaking a dark violet fluid that burned the ground like acid.

“Well. That’s original” Smokey commented. She could see, hear, and smell the illusion this time, no, it wasn’t an illusion, to realistic. She was under an enchantment. Wonderful. The illusionist was an enchanter, and she was screwing with Smokey’s perception of reality. “And this is why I don’t ask for challenges”

Labradorite smiled as she looked around at what she saw. This gem’s imagination was far more vivid then most, she really had constructed a hellish nightmare scenario, and oh the body she was in? she loved how twisted and monstrous it was. Must be someone close to the grey woman, Lab thought to herself as she advanced leading the army of monsters behind her, opening the mask like mouth of her imagined form she spoke “Why? Why’d you do this to me?” she accused. Alright, she had to admit, she didn’t know the history, but Lab was good at guessing, and most people don’t imagine someone as screwed up as this unless they feel responsible somehow. Raising ‘her’ arm cannon Labradorite fired off a shot of real energy at the grey gem.

Smokey dodged and then charged at ‘Azezulite’ “I’m sorry I don’t believe we’ve met, care to introduce yourself?” she asked as she closed the distance and swung her halberd.

Labradorite grimaced behind the mask of her borrowed form. The gem hadn’t actually met this person? She just imagined someone this messed up? Or she’d forgotten who she’d done something terrible to? Either way that was decidedly messed up, Lab liked it. How callous to do something so obviously terrible to someone and not even remember them! Oh she loved that! A kindred spirit! “Don’t you remember me!? How could you forget after what you did to me!” she made the phantom scream in a distorted voice that sounded like nails on a chalk board.

Smokey rolled her eyes. The enchantress was making the assumption that this was all things pulled from Smokey’s subconscious. And that she DID know the Azezulite that stood before her. So she was experienced in her powers, that much was certain since she didn’t raise to the bait and drop the pretenses. That was good. Azezulite hadn’t actually faced anything like this before, and some one experienced at this would be able to deal with her emotionless nature long enough to make Azezulite fuse. The fact that the enchantment was still holding together after Smokey had utterly disbelieved it was a testament to it’s creators skill. Disbelieving a powerful illusion was not easy, it wasn’t like saying ‘this isn’t real’ it was like saying ‘the fire burns because it is so cold, not because it is hot’ one had to absolutely reject what their mind was accepting as a basic fact of reality, and you had to convince your mind that it was in fact in error. After that, illusions almost always fell apart. This one however was still standing.

Labradorite was getting nervous now; the grey gem wasn’t reacting to her. She SAW her, she saw all of this, and her enchantment was tricking all of the gems senses it had to be, she could feel it working but the gem just didn’t seem to care. It was infuriating, so much so that Lab lost her temper and charged the tall grey woman. Of course doing so was a mistake, the moment her avatar had tried to swing that giant arm blade at Smokey it was countered with the halberd which had passed right through the avatar. Normally that shouldn’t have happened, it should have hurt the gem, made her shake or something.

Smokey gave a tired smile at ‘Azezulite’ “so, that’s where your hiding” she said before she thrust her halberd forward, the glave like pike passing just under Labradorite’s arm before it turned up and she found herself pinned to the trunk of a tree held in place by the halberds hook acting as an easily escapable restraint, of course before she could even try to free herself a second halberd had fallowed it holding her other arm in place. It was a very easy to escape binding, she had plenty of freedom of movement but that wasn’t the problem, the Third halberd pointed at her gut kept her in place as the gem spoke again “now, if you would kindly disband your enchantment and introduce yourself? I’d rather not poof you right now”

Labradorite gulped but obeyed as she glared daggers at the gem. She wasn’t high off the ground, only a couple feet, enough to be held at eye level with the woman. She remained silent as she glared daggers at her.

Smokey sighed in exasperation “fine. I’ll go first. I’m Smokey Quartz. I’m older then dirt. You’re a Labradorite.” Smokey looked at Labradorite closely examining every feature “ohh. I remember you now. You’re White Diamonds little pet witch.”

Labradorite growled she was no one’s damned pet, and she would not be talked down to by some mass produced soldier “Let me go you mindless hell beast or I’ll bring down so much hell on you your low class warrior mind will melt out your nose”

Smokey rolled her eyes “Charming.” She said sarcastically before she cupped her jaw contemplatively. Psychopath it was then. “Right. So here’s the part where I offer you a deal. The deal being you do me a favor, fight a pair of gems for me and make them fuse, do that and I let you live” she looked at Labradorite through a half-cocked eye and raised a hand to silence her as she opened her mouth “this is the part where you throw out some vulgar insult regarding my class and intelligence while refusing the deal, putting up a show of bravado saying your life’s not that cheap yes?” Lab glared at the tall gem “so let’s skip all that go directly to my counter offer. You’re a psychopath who delights in tormenting her victims and making a game out of it. So, I will let you live obviously, and the sweetener is this. I will bring TWO gems to your forest. One will be under my personal protection, the other won’t be. You may do whatever you want to the gem that is not under my protection, however if you harm so much as a hair on the head of the gem I AM protecting I shall stalk and hunt you as you torment the gems I brought here. Sound entertaining?” Smokey asked as she looked at the blue skinned ex-noble

Labradorite thought about it. It was infuriating having her own words put in her mouth. The damn quartz seemed to know everything Lab was going to say before she said it. But the offer was enticing, an element of danger to her otherwise boring little hunts. The humans were fun, they screamed, they bleed, they had a wondrously vast range of expressions. But they weren’t a challenge. Gems were far better prey. They put up a fight, they could suffer much longer, and when she shattered their gems it was always so much more satisfying then when a human just…… died. And the added thrill of someone possibly hunting her if she chose the wrong victim? Ohh that was exciting. Dangerous, and terrifying, but exciting. She wasn’t going to give this gem the satisfaction of a ‘yes’ so she simply nodded her acceptance. She’d need to plan this out but Lab had decided that, when Smokey brought forth her sacrifice, she’d stalk all three of them, she’d capture and incapacitate Smokey, then she’d make her watch as her friend and whoever else she brought with were slowly tortured to death. Oh yes, that would be delicious.

Smokey smiled “Good.” With a snap of her fingers the two extra halberds disappeared letting Lab drop to the ground “fallow me, I’m taking you to where you are going to wait. I’ll explain who your targets are and what I expect of you on the way”

Description
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Smokey Quartz was, as was now clearly her pattern, sleeping at her desk, eyes glassed over in mental exhaustion, crumpled sheets of paper surrounding her, and a line of drool leaking from her mouth as her head pointed up at the ceiling; after almost any of her writing or planning sessions Smokey would remain like this four hours, and other then the occasional twitch she would remain utterly motionless. Pink Pearl hadn’t been sure what to do at first. She didn’t want to disturb her mistress but she was also concerned, eventually Smokey had simply told Pink Pearl that it was nothing, and to treat her like a piece of furniture when she was like that; move her, clean around her, set her back up. Which is exactly what Pink was doing, Smokey didn’t even notice the vacuum being used as Pink re-ordered the room, putting books away, refiling the inkwell and capping it, putting the crumpled up papers that littered the ground around the desk into the trash, organizing the mess that was the desk itself. Normally this is where Pink would leave things. The room was tidy again, and Smokey was doing her ‘not sleeping’ thing.

Normaly this is where Pink would leave things. Normaly. But Smokey had been doing this to herself every day this week. She’d wake up, have Tea once or twice with Pink, complement her on it, make small talk, and go right back to her office where she’d write and crumple up papers and end up in this same state every time. Smokey had never mentioned what she was working on so feverantly, and Pink knew that, as a pearl, it wasn’t her place to ask. Of course, that didn’t stop her from being a little curious. It was rude to intrude she reminded herself again, but it was also her place to help serve her mistress to the best of her ability’s so maybe a tinny peek wouldn’t hurt anything? Pink paused, she was hesitant, she wasn’t a defect, but she remembered what Smokey had said, Her pearls needed to be smarter than the rest, they couldn’t always wait around for her to order them to do something because she had more important things to do then micro-manage. It wasn’t as though she was going to DO anything her mistress didn’t already imply she should do just…. Read some papers on a desk.

Her mind made up Pink finished cleaning the room, which consisted of dapping the drool off Smokey’s cheek and closing her mouth enough se wouldn’t drool on herself any more then she already had. Pink then turned to the papers on the desk. ‘I’ll need to read them to properly organize them’ she told herself. The first sheet had a name, White Azezulite, and an arrow pointing to a second name Black Azezulite fallowed by a question mark, beneath the names was a simple almost featureless drawing of a gem, a circle over her left breast with an arrow pointing towards a circle over the right breast and a note ‘Symbolic?’ all along the sides of the drawing were point form notes. ‘No Emotions at all?’ ‘Power inversion.’ ‘Memories intact’ ‘simple cloths, why?’ and so forth and so on. Honestly, the names and all the notes meant nothing to Pink, moving on to the next page were more notes, although it was a bit more detailed then the previous page.

Problem:
Transmutation? From White Azezulite to Black Azezulite, Gemstone changed as well.

Things that could cause Transmutation:
Fusion: With who? And for this long?

Internal damage \
Latent Defect -----------> Rose’s Tears could fix these!
Internal Engraving /

Problem: Rose turned herself into that hybrid. Killing it might bring Rose back, but she won’t help me if I do that. Tears out of reach for the next 100+ years at best.
Psychological? Az didn’t get attacked when the change happened.

Problem: who’d bother giving her treatment? Home world likes her like this

How to fix? Fusion? Need to Fuse to find out. Az won’t fuse with me. Fusion can’t be forced….

I am going to have to kill Az

Other pages were similar albeit far more detailed, one page was devoted entirely to the idea of killing Steven in a ploy to bring rose back just to gain access to her tears, this page ended with comments about not ending one innocent life to save another and that Rose would never forgive Smokey for doing something like that. Several other pages were dedicated to the idea of using fusion on ‘Az’. Many of the plans were rather detailed and elaborate including everything from creating a situation that would force someone who didn’t trust her to fuse with Smokey, to exactly what she may encounter in a broken mindscape, how to take command of that mental landscape, and how to fix almost any imaginable problem one might find. Of course all of these pages ended with the comment “She will never Fuse with me. Not Now.” A few of the pages on fusion however seemed to acknowledge this fact and outlined what someone else could do, and how they’d need to do it. There were even plans for finding and grooming someone to be the type of person ‘Az’ would fuse with to trick her into letting them inside her mind. Another page detailed the appearance of an orange and gold gem that was traveling with ‘Az’ now, and how to convince them to go along with the plan, but notes at the end discouraged this stating ‘No way to communicate without Az suspecting me’

Pink Pearl could admit, she did not know who ‘Az’ was, not really, just a random gem as far as she knew. But if all Smokey Quartz needed was someone else to fuse with ‘Az’ and she just didn’t know anyone, well Pink knew plenty of gems. Specifically she knew an ‘orange and gold armored gem’ called Spessarite, and having never seen or met this ‘Az’ before she could easily convey messages without revealing who she was working for. Pink Pearl smiled to herself as she finished cleaning the desk and went to make some tea for when Smokey woke up. ‘Honestly, if my mistress just told me things like this it would have saved her so much trouble. I’m a pearl I was made to serve’ she thought to herself proudly as she began figuring out how to bring up her knowledge to Smokey Quartz in the politest way possible.

When Smokey woke from her torpor she made her usual trip to the dining room, a rather well furnished cavern chamber with an oil lit brass chandelier, a restored seventeen hundreds cheery oak dining table and matching chairs, a gem tech based ‘oven stove’ which Pink Pearl used to make Smokey her tea, and flowers. Sitting in the center of the table was a vase of lily’s that grew naturally on the island, on carved stone shelves cut into the walls were pots of varying other local flora, daffodils, carnations, lilacs and so forth, while strung up along the walls were various flowering vines, that all combined to give the chamber a greenhouse-esc sort of feeling. As per her custom upon waking Smokey lurched towards the table and took a seat, waiting patiently for Pink to serve her some tea. Pearl had known a few gems in her time, but few were as anti-social when they first woke up as Smokey was. Before she had her first cup she was at best a mute shell of herself waiting for energy to fill her. At worst, she was unbearably contactors, and sarcastic. But once she had that first critical cup of something she was back to the endlessly patient gem that adopted Pink. So she waited until her mistress had downed that first cup before saying anything.

“hmmm. Delicious” Smokey said as she savored every drop of the dark liquid. “a second cup if you would be so kind” she politely asked after she finished the first, to which Pink refiled the cup and took a seat across from Smokey and poured herself a cup as well. Unlike Smokey she wasn’t as great a fan of tea and had to add a few drops of honey to sweeten it “So my dear, have you put much thought into a personal name yet?” Smokey asked politely, it was honestly only the second time she had asked, clearly not wanting to pressure Pink Pearl over it.

Pink blushed and hid her face behind her cup as she sipped at the contents, Smokey’s usual morning chit-chat wasn’t so serious, then again, it had been over a week since the last time she asked…. Slowly putting her cup down Pink nodded, still blushing at the idea. “Rose” she practically whispered. She had noticed that Smokey’s pearls tended to name themselves in accordance with their colours, her Black Pearl was Noir, and her Red Pearl was Scarlet. Honestly, Pink had thought about insisting that ‘Pink Pearl’ was good enough and that just ‘Pink’ would suffice, but she didn’t want to object to what was a flattering request, Smokey wanted pink to have a special name because she considered her to be better than all the other Pink Pearls out there; which made it extraordinarily difficult to refuse the request to name herself. Of course this left Pink with the problem of having to come up with a name that she felt would go nicely with the naming theme of her predecessors, not a lot of names jumped out when she considered her colour, if she’d been a white pearl she’d have simply gone with ivory, a black pearl could get away with ebony, honestly the only colour that would be as bad off as she was would have been a Gold Pearl. Pink had considered the name Rose the longest, she liked it, it was nice, soft sounding, and had an air of sophistication. Of course her fear was that because Rose was also the name of Rose Quartz Smokey would refuse it, Pink had a few fall backs, but nothing jumped out of her mind like Rose had.

Smokey smiled from across the table “That’s a lovely name Rose” she said softly completely erasing all of Pink, or rather Rose’s fears over her name. she really needed to remember that Smokey wasn’t at all like Pink Opal, Rose hadn’t known her long enough to judge but she doubted anything could actually shake her new mistress. “So, while I’ve been cooped up in my study, what have you been up to? Explore the island any further?” she asked with a smirk.

Pink blushed a bit, Smokey had a tendency to work for long stints without rest, hardly leaving her study at all. However she made sure that Rose would spend at least some time outside doing something, it was why the kitchen was as decorated in flora as it was. On the few occasions where Smokey admitted she needed a rest she would go out with Rose and enjoy the flower field in the center of the island. Truth be told however, Rose hadn’t gone out yesterday, or done anything for herself for that matter, something that would typically earn her a light scolding from Smokey who would then drag her outside and take them both on a long nature hike around the island, and possibly on the warp-pad to some far flung location somewhere. Thankfully Rose had a way out of any potential scolding and forced relaxation today “actually, when I was cleaning your office I couldn’t help but read some of the papers you were working on” Rose said shyly hoping that Smokey would not notice the abrupt change of subjects.

What Rose saw was not at all what she expected; Smokey tensed up slightly, her lips pressed as she nodded slowly “Ah….. Those” her voice was heavy and she sounded very much like a gem who had just been caught red handed doing something she shouldn’t be. “It’s nothing for you to worry about….. I, I know what I have to do. I’m just…. Procrastinating” she said in a very controlled and neutral voice that was clearly meant to hide and obscure any and all emotions.

This change in her mistress’s attitude at the mere mention of her work set off alarm bells for Rose. Smokey clearly had come to the conclusion that she had to kill this ‘Az’ because she had no other viable plan, and she was intentionally delaying it as much as she could. Rose opened her mouth and hoped she wasn’t about to put her foot there as she spoke her mind “Well, when I was reading, I noticed you wanted to find some way to talk to Spessarite, and I thought I might be able to act as a go-between for you” she said with far less confidence then she had intended

Smokey raised an eyebrow “Spessarite?” she asked slightly confused

Rose nodded “The orange gem with golden armor” she explained. As soon as the words left her mouth Smokey had turned into a cloud of vapor which was rushing as much as any cloud could rush towards Rose, it then turned back into Smokey Quartz who grabbed the still shocked pearl out of her seat and hugged her so tightly that, if she were human, she’d be feeling things crack

“ROSE!” she exclaimed then holding the pearl up by the shoulders brought her forwards and kissed her “You might have just solved all my problems!” Smokey practically shouted, the largest smile Rose had ever seen painted on the usually controlled face of her mistress. Smokey set Rose down and dusted her off before flattening her own trench coat. “Now, I assume you have some sort of a plan. Black Azezulite is very dangerous and if she thinks you are my pearl, well, at best it simply won’t end well for you”

Rose nodded “I’ve never met her, and everyone else who knows me either thinks I am Pink Opals pearl, or that I am still trying to find a good master, so….. I just won’t mention I’m yours” she said, rubbing her left shoulder a bit. Smokey’s hugs were a bit tight she noted, not painful but tight.

Smokey nodded “and this Spessarite, you think she’ll listen to you?”

Rose nodded “She fought with Sunstone and Pink Opal to keep Bloodstone in check for the last several thousand years” Rose’s voice was particularly cold at that comment.

“I thought you said you’d never seen fighting before your fusion with Pink Opal” Smokey asked, eyebrow raised

“I didn’t” was all Rose said. And it’s all she needed to say as Smokey nodded understanding her meaning all to well. To think some one would just leave a pearl like this alone for so long and then abandon her when she became ‘inconvenient’ filled Smokey with her ususal quite rage, something she latched onto and bottled for later.

“well…. I suppose your going to want to know about Azezulite” Smokey said in a sullen tone as she walked back to her seat “get comfortable my precious Rose, this is a… painful story for me to repeat. I’m a bit of a perfectionist, and I don’t like making mistakes, especially one’s that hurt others more than myself”

As Rose took up her seat and started to listen Smokey began her story “I’ve been around for a while Rose, so, it stands to reason I’ve made my fair share of mistakes, I’d like to think I made less than my share to be honest. I’m sure most gem’s think the same” Smokey sipped her tea “Azezulite however stands apart and above most of those errors in judgment. To start with, she was originally White Azezulite, she and I came from the same mineral vain as well, although I came from far deeper in the ground. In my time I learned of what organics call ‘family’ and, by an approximate definition, White Azezulite, Az, would be my sister. We emerged not to far apart in either space or time, only about thousand years, and a few hundred or so clicks. Now, I’m a strategist, tactician, and warrior. For me, the ways of destroying one’s enemy through military conflict come rather naturally. I won’t bore you with the details, but you can assume that I am like most quartz as far as military histories are concerned. That being said, Azezulite was quite my opposite. She disliked violence, she hated seeing anyone hurt, or hearing about people dying. I suppose it was because of her nature in this regard that she held the positon she did. Az oversaw the kinder garden on her world, she taught newly emerged gems about gem society, and culture, taught them how to fuse, and how to summon their weapon to protect themselves, even coached them through discovering and mastering their unique ability’s” Smokey sipped some more of her tea, watching Rose carefully as she did.

“Now, when Rose Quartz started her rebellion on earth, it sent shockwaves across the empire. I did not agree with all or even most of her reasons at the time. But I did agree that it was time for our society to change, by force if necessary. As you know, I am a cautious person. I do not rush head long into things, so I waited. And I carefully thought through my own positon before committing myself, by which point I had my choice of worlds to rebel upon. I discarded worlds where the rebellion was sure to succeed as it did not serve my pruposes, and I also ignored the worlds where rebellion would be crushed, no point fighting a battle that’s already lost. Even sticking to the worlds where a few key players would shift the balance there were plenty of options…….. Out of….. I’m honestly not sure if it was pride, arrogance, love, or just sentimentality, I chose the world Azezulite was on, where she ran the kinder garden” Smokey looked down at her tea “at the time, I told myself it was the logical choice. She was my ‘sister’ my closest friend, ally, and supporter. Her world was one that the rebels were unlikely to take, so, my appearance there, my turning the kinder garden overseer to my side, and in turn taking the world for the rebellion would cement my status as a great leader.” Smokey let out a heavy sigh “It honestly came as no suppose that Az wanted nothing to do with the rebellion, in fact she was so opposed to the concept that she refused to take up sides. She really did try to stay neutral, and it was working to. Gems on both sides were raised by her and they respected her enough not to push the mater…. But I wanted my sure thing, no, I wanted Az on my side, I wanted her to say I was right. So I kept trying to force her hand” Smokey looked towards a collection of plants sitting on the shelves, she looked like she was about to say something before she caught herself and carried on with the tale “I kept telling her she couldn’t be neutral on this. That she had to pick a side, that not fighting was doing more damage than actually fighting. Well” Smokey folded her hands together “eventually it was too much, she couldn’t stand the strain of watching gems kill each other, and I imagine my arguments only made things worse. I wasn’t there when it happened, but she self-transmuted, from White Azezulite, to Black Azezulite, but so unlike any normal Black Azezulite, she had stripped out all of her emotions, and ability to feel. She was just a thing of logic and calculation. I spent a long time trying to figure out exactly what happened to her Rose. Transmutation outside of fusion is so rare that it’s almost undocumented, typically, the resulting transformation is considered an improvement, other times the result is, essentially, what you see with corrupted gems.” Smokey finished her story and began sipping at her tea which had grown cold by now

Rose blinked. Then she blinked again. Her mind was processing everything Smokey had told her, but very slowly, it kept getting stuck on the ‘transmutation’ part of things. How did a gem lock away their emotions. Even if they did that, how did a gem just…… become another kind of gem, similar or not. Why would a gem ever even do that anyway? Sure her feelings were hurt when Pink Opal abandoned her but even then, at her absolute worst she couldn’t imagine just…. Not feeling, and deciding to not feel anything ever again. It was heart breaking, and the fact that Smokey had caused that, and held herself accountable for it? Rose felt terrible for her mistress. She couldn’t imagine what it must have been like to lose someone close to her in such a way, she wasn’t all that familiar with what a ‘sister’ was but if it was even slightly like her relationship with Pink Opal, Smokey must have felt like she was being torn apart from the inside out from the moment it happened until well… the pain didn’t really stop for Rose until Smokey had taken her in, so maybe she was still hurting just the same as the day it happened. But the story also made Rose irritated. She wasn’t sure why but something about it all ticked a nerve and just bothered her. Not angry or stand up and shout, and not internal horror, fear or dread, but something else. Something just… scratched in the back of her mind and irritated her.

Smokey folded her hands in front of her after she finished her tea “Now then, with that out of the way, I won’t be having you carrier messages back and forth until after I have everything else in order. Namely, I need to find us both bait, and an ideal location” she continued

Rose blinked, the sudden chance in Smokey’s tone from solemn and sullen to business as usual was somewhat jarring to behold. “Bait? Location?” Rose asked a bit confused

Smokey smiled “Yes, we need bait, something or someone that Azezulite would consider enough of a threat to warrant using fusion against, a corrupted gem or a particularly dangerous combatant would be ideal. I’d use myself but she knows that unless I have a plan in motion I tend to run, and if I don’t well, she’ll know something’s up and will herself retreat. So she needs a valid threat that’s not me” Smokey waved her hand in the air absently before carrying on “as for location, I need to lure her some place where retreat is a less viable option then staying and fighting it out with whatever monster I set her up against. A cave system, canyon, enclosed building, or something similar would be ideal, failing that somewhere removed from a warp pad so that if she were to try retreat, she’d have to out run her enemy for some time”

Rose processed the information. It made senses when she thought about it, if you could avoid an unnecessary fight, why bother with the fight at all? Which meant her mistress needed to make this into something where Azezulite felt she needed to fight all out, but if she was setting something like that up…. “But if you do all that, doesn’t that mean you’ll be putting Azezulite and Spessarite’s lives at risk?” she asked as the thought entered her mind

Smokey nodded “sadly, that’s unavoidable. The danger needs to be real. That’s not to say I won’t be waiting in the wings to step in and stop my own plans if things go horribly awry”

This brought another thought to the front of Rose’s mind “but, if it’s something dangerous enough to make Azezulite and Spessarite fuse, won’t it be to strong for you to beat on your own?”

To that Smokey smiled, it was an odd thing, a slight curling at the corners of her lips, a pulling at the sides of her eyes. “Despite what Black Azezulite might like to believe, she is not a warrior and is still very much White Azezulite at heart. I grant that she is clever, can’t be intimidated as she literally dose not experience fear, and has improved her skills from what they were to start with, but, ultimately, she is still White Azezulite, a gem who so greatly disliked violence, her combat training began and ended with the basic’s taught to all gems before they were handed off to varying specialists. Backing her into a corner has never been a significant problem for me in the past. I just never had the means to finish my plans before now” she said in a very…. Controlled and tightened voice, one that was clearly experienced at holding back and restraining emotions, although some still slipped through, like her excitement and her bitterness at having not been able to correct this mistake any sooner. “Now, Rose, I am going to head out and find us some bait and a suitable location, while I’m out, you figure out the safest way for you to approach this Spessarite” With that Smokey stood up and headed out of the cavern to the islands warp pad.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Smokey had scouted a few possible locations to set up her trap. The best she’d seen by far was a mountain top, it would take Az and ‘Spessarite’ some time to scale with no quite route back to the warp pad, the large open environment would also not hinder their fusion any with it’s high mobility and powerful ranged weapon. Now all she needed was to find some ‘bait’ sadly the mountain had already been cleared of obstacles, all the local corruptions were either dead or to small to pose a threat. The crystal gems had clearly been very busy gems in the last four thousand years as it was rather difficult to find corruptions at all, let alone powerful one’s that would pose enough of a threat to Azezulite to force her to fuse.

At this point Smokey was walking through one of earths many forests hoping to find something nasty, although her expectations were rather low. That’s when she noticed something. Overcast cloudy sky, heavy fog, and encroaching shadows. Unfortunately her skin was not feeling moist from the fog, and her black hair was still warm from the sun, which meant this was all an illusion. Smokey smiled. She hated illusionists so damn much, this was perfect. Either a corruption or a gem capable of making illusions was in the area and had marked Smokey as their target. As she continued to walk observing everything around her and comparing it to what her other senses said. This was a gem she reasoned. A corruption wouldn’t bother with ‘atmosphere’ like this. Smokey summoned up her halberd and half closed her eyes. Illusions like this meant the gem could make herself invisible, which is what a corruption would have done. Smokey inhaled the air; it was dry, which did not fit with the fog at all, although she did now feel moister on her skin. Two senses at once, not bad. ‘From behind or beside’ she asked herself as she stood still and waited. Side she realized as she pivoted in place avoiding an incoming bolt of energy, she then looked in the direction of the blast. Her target was invisible still. ‘Smart’ she thought, although that wasn’t going to help them any, now that Smokey had a rough idea of their positon she walked in the general direction swinging her halberd lazily in wide arc’s in front of her. The halberd was a terrible weapon for a one on one melee, however, its reach meant that as a search tool it worked wonders, all she needed was for the little witch to get freaked out by the pole arm swinging wildly and make a move. Oh, there it was, Smokey smirked as she heard leaves crunch, her eyes looking down and tracking the motions of the broken twigs and cracking foliage. As Smokey pursued the invisible gem another scent caught her attention, metallic, iron if she had to guess, along with a bit of organic rot. Blood and gore then, so this gem liked to go around killing the locals but wasn’t a corruption. Sociopath or psychopath became the only question in Smokey’s mind as she pursued her quarry.

She had made a clear miscalculation Labradorite thought to herself. This gem was not intimidated by the weather, and she anticipated the attack. Normally this wouldn’t be enough to make Lab run, but it had been a very long time since she had actually stalked another gem, let alone one that was clearly of the warrior cast rather than some lost noble or their servant. Warriors were harder to deal with, they didn’t scare easy, they had sharp senses, and if they caught her, well Lab fancied herself a bit of a sorceress, and the wizard never fared well against someone with a big sharp stick of they got in close. No she’d need to fall back, re-evaluate, and chip away at this gem. She just needed to figure out what they feared. Everyone had a personal nightmare, and Labradorite specialized in finding it and bringing that to the surface. The only problem was, with a gem she’d need to make physical contact, ideally with their gem. And a cursory examination of the strange grey woman revealed that hers was concealed, probably under that trench coat she wore, or beneath those gloves on her hands. Probably the hands since she didn’t reach any ware to summon up that nasty looking halberd.

As Smokey paced towards Labrodite who was gaining distance on her she kept her eyes low. They weren’t trustworthy, but they were good at confirming the source of the sounds each time they spotted the foliage on the ground get crushed, so many gems made the mistake of trusting their eyes and looking around when they fought illusionists, when the trick was to distrust all the senses, particularly the eyes unless you could cross verify them somehow, and by the stars, look at the ground! Most illusionists that made themselves invisible forgot that their foot prints weren’t, and so rarely if ever created illusions to hide their tracks. As she kept advancing Smokey wondered when the last time this gem had encountered another of her species had been, prolonged isolation could honestly have caused her to just assume anything humanoid is hostile, and she might honestly not remember how to tell a gem from a human anymore, or even what she is if it had been long enough without anyone to talk to.

With more than a good lead on Smokey Labradorite appraised her. Tall, weapon drawn, no visible gem, eyes downcast, but a loss and easy walk. The tall grey gem did not consider her to be a threat Labradorite realized. So long as she was smart about it, getting in for that fatal touch wouldn’t be to hard, the gem wasn’t really looking around for her, just listening, and well, Lab wasn’t one to boast, oh who was she kidding, she loved boasting. She was a master illusionist, Sight, Sound, Touch. She could create illusions so real people died of fear. And once she physically touched some one? Then the REAL fun began as she transformed their world into a waking nightmare from which there was no escape, save the sweet release of death which Lab delighted in withholding while she took in their terror like a fine wine, and the best flavors came from those who seemed so courageous.

Smokey stopped walking and began looking around. The forest had gone completely silent. Looking from tree to tree she saw birds in the upper branches and insects buzzing in the distance, but there was no sound. So, this gem had figured her out, not a surprise really, some human had to have caught on and tried the same trick before her, they couldn’t be that stupid. Still, anticipating where the danger would come from just got a whole lot harder now. And if the illusionist had gotten particularly serious most of Smokey’s defensive tricks were probably out the window. So, new plan. Smokey was old, and experienced, she’d fought more xenoforms with more varied and unique abilities then most gems, and that had taught her solutions to interesting problems. Like what do you do when your enemy is invisible, and inaudible? Why, you did nothing of course. And that’s what Smokey did, she stood there still as could be and waited for the illusionist to strike.

Labradorite was adamantly confused at what she was seeing. The grey Noir reject was just standing there like a bump on a log. Now, Lab wasn’t stupid, she knew what was probably going through the gems head, ‘where is the invisible enemy? Why can’t I hear anything? This is a trap, what’s the safest move?” it was a fear of a sort Lab supposed, but honestly it was as boring and tasteless as cardboard. So, while the giant dope stood there like an idiot trying to think of a way out of this Labradorite carefully approached from behind. She had no idea where the woman’s gem was, so she’d have to make due with indirect contact and hope her enchantments were more effective on gems then she remembered. Hand outstretched she touched the grey woman in the center of her back, the second it took her to turn and strike at where Labradorite was had been enough.

Smokey felt a hand touch her, and on reflex she span around, feeling the hand move with her as the gem it belonged to evaded the axe head of Smokey’s halberd, not a hard feat this close though. As the hand left her back the world around Smokey changed, she was not in the forest any more, she was on a now long since dead world, and she was surrounded by giant misshapen creatures of flesh and steel armed with massive cannons on their backs, while in front of them stood equally mangled alien cyborgs, their cybernetics hastily implanted as their world died. This was the last stand of a doomed race. Smokey recognized everything she saw, most of the details were how she remembered them, but a few things had changed for the worse, her forces were fewer, all that remained were wounded and barley able to stand let alone fight, and Scarlet looked to be on her last legs. Smokey scowled. Scarlets death was one of the most painful moments in her life, but she did not die here, at this point in her life Gold Pearl was her pearl, and she’d never dare come to the front lines. It was tiny details like that which lead Smokey to understand what was going on. This wasn’t a memory re-creation, it was a mental simulation of her greatest fears, and at her age, Smokey had lived through everything that she feared. Had she been younger, perhaps only a quarter of her age, this vision would terrify her and she’d treat it as real. But she knew better, she knew she was on the planet earth, in a forest filled with trees not on a barren world in a box canyon, she knew her failings, she accepted them and moved on. That’s what she told herself when Black Azezulite marched forward, a disfigured half corrupted mockery of White Azezulite. Her form was distorted, her face was a broken and stitched together porcelain mask made to resemble White Az’s face, behind the cracks Smokey could see squirming tentacles and tiny mouths. Azezulites left arm was awkwardly fused to a giant cannon, her flesh stretched around it as cables bore into her body for stability, her right arm ended in a long cybernetic blade that had somehow been welded to her flesh. Her legs were reverse joined and elongated like an ostriches, only her torso seemed relatively unmarred, save for the gem of course, which was broken and leaking a dark violet fluid that burned the ground like acid.

“Well. That’s original” Smokey commented. She could see, hear, and smell the illusion this time, no, it wasn’t an illusion, to realistic. She was under an enchantment. Wonderful. The illusionist was an enchanter, and she was screwing with Smokey’s perception of reality. “And this is why I don’t ask for challenges”

Labradorite smiled as she looked around at what she saw. This gem’s imagination was far more vivid then most, she really had constructed a hellish nightmare scenario, and oh the body she was in? she loved how twisted and monstrous it was. Must be someone close to the grey woman, Lab thought to herself as she advanced leading the army of monsters behind her, opening the mask like mouth of her imagined form she spoke “Why? Why’d you do this to me?” she accused. Alright, she had to admit, she didn’t know the history, but Lab was good at guessing, and most people don’t imagine someone as screwed up as this unless they feel responsible somehow. Raising ‘her’ arm cannon Labradorite fired off a shot of real energy at the grey gem.

Smokey dodged and then charged at ‘Azezulite’ “I’m sorry I don’t believe we’ve met, care to introduce yourself?” she asked as she closed the distance and swung her halberd.

Labradorite grimaced behind the mask of her borrowed form. The gem hadn’t actually met this person? She just imagined someone this messed up? Or she’d forgotten who she’d done something terrible to? Either way that was decidedly messed up, Lab liked it. How callous to do something so obviously terrible to someone and not even remember them! Oh she loved that! A kindred spirit! “Don’t you remember me!? How could you forget after what you did to me!” she made the phantom scream in a distorted voice that sounded like nails on a chalk board.

Smokey rolled her eyes. The enchantress was making the assumption that this was all things pulled from Smokey’s subconscious. And that she DID know the Azezulite that stood before her. So she was experienced in her powers, that much was certain since she didn’t raise to the bait and drop the pretenses. That was good. Azezulite hadn’t actually faced anything like this before, and some one experienced at this would be able to deal with her emotionless nature long enough to make Azezulite fuse. The fact that the enchantment was still holding together after Smokey had utterly disbelieved it was a testament to it’s creators skill. Disbelieving a powerful illusion was not easy, it wasn’t like saying ‘this isn’t real’ it was like saying ‘the fire burns because it is so cold, not because it is hot’ one had to absolutely reject what their mind was accepting as a basic fact of reality, and you had to convince your mind that it was in fact in error. After that, illusions almost always fell apart. This one however was still standing.

Labradorite was getting nervous now; the grey gem wasn’t reacting to her. She SAW her, she saw all of this, and her enchantment was tricking all of the gems senses it had to be, she could feel it working but the gem just didn’t seem to care. It was infuriating, so much so that Lab lost her temper and charged the tall grey woman. Of course doing so was a mistake, the moment her avatar had tried to swing that giant arm blade at Smokey it was countered with the halberd which had passed right through the avatar. Normally that shouldn’t have happened, it should have hurt the gem, made her shake or something.

Smokey gave a tired smile at ‘Azezulite’ “so, that’s where your hiding” she said before she thrust her halberd forward, the glave like pike passing just under Labradorite’s arm before it turned up and she found herself pinned to the trunk of a tree held in place by the halberds hook acting as an easily escapable restraint, of course before she could even try to free herself a second halberd had fallowed it holding her other arm in place. It was a very easy to escape binding, she had plenty of freedom of movement but that wasn’t the problem, the Third halberd pointed at her gut kept her in place as the gem spoke again “now, if you would kindly disband your enchantment and introduce yourself? I’d rather not poof you right now”

Labradorite gulped but obeyed as she glared daggers at the gem. She wasn’t high off the ground, only a couple feet, enough to be held at eye level with the woman. She remained silent as she glared daggers at her.

Smokey sighed in exasperation “fine. I’ll go first. I’m Smokey Quartz. I’m older then dirt. You’re a Labradorite.” Smokey looked at Labradorite closely examining every feature “ohh. I remember you now. You’re White Diamonds little pet witch.”

Labradorite growled she was no one’s damned pet, and she would not be talked down to by some mass produced soldier “Let me go you mindless hell beast or I’ll bring down so much hell on you your low class warrior mind will melt out your nose”

Smokey rolled her eyes “Charming.” She said sarcastically before she cupped her jaw contemplatively. Psychopath it was then. “Right. So here’s the part where I offer you a deal. The deal being you do me a favor, fight a pair of gems for me and make them fuse, do that and I let you live” she looked at Labradorite through a half-cocked eye and raised a hand to silence her as she opened her mouth “this is the part where you throw out some vulgar insult regarding my class and intelligence while refusing the deal, putting up a show of bravado saying your life’s not that cheap yes?” Lab glared at the tall gem “so let’s skip all that go directly to my counter offer. You’re a psychopath who delights in tormenting her victims and making a game out of it. So, I will let you live obviously, and the sweetener is this. I will bring TWO gems to your forest. One will be under my personal protection, the other won’t be. You may do whatever you want to the gem that is not under my protection, however if you harm so much as a hair on the head of the gem I AM protecting I shall stalk and hunt you as you torment the gems I brought here. Sound entertaining?” Smokey asked as she looked at the blue skinned ex-noble

Labradorite thought about it. It was infuriating having her own words put in her mouth. The damn quartz seemed to know everything Lab was going to say before she said it. But the offer was enticing, an element of danger to her otherwise boring little hunts. The humans were fun, they screamed, they bleed, they had a wondrously vast range of expressions. But they weren’t a challenge. Gems were far better prey. They put up a fight, they could suffer much longer, and when she shattered their gems it was always so much more satisfying then when a human just…… died. And the added thrill of someone possibly hunting her if she chose the wrong victim? Ohh that was exciting. Dangerous, and terrifying, but exciting. She wasn’t going to give this gem the satisfaction of a ‘yes’ so she simply nodded her acceptance. She’d need to plan this out but Lab had decided that, when Smokey brought forth her sacrifice, she’d stalk all three of them, she’d capture and incapacitate Smokey, then she’d make her watch as her friend and whoever else she brought with were slowly tortured to death. Oh yes, that would be delicious.

Smokey smiled “Good.” With a snap of her fingers the two extra halberds disappeared letting Lab drop to the ground “fallow me, I’m taking you to where you are going to wait. I’ll explain who your targets are and what I expect of you on the way”