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“So we realized the bird was going to be too much for us to defeat it and protect Steven—I mean, I probably would have been good on my own, but I didn’t want Pearl to get scared, you know?—so we fused and just kicked butt! ”
The little Amethyst, Facet-5 Cut-8XM, held her arms out, wriggling her fingers, coaxing out an applause that didn’t come. An odd result, given that she was surrounded by quartz soldiers and had just described a victory in battle. But all around the barracks, amused, if rapt, attention had turned to confusion and concern.
“Wait…” Carnelian looked back to her compatriot quartzes, glad to see there were similar lines of tension on their faces. She really did hate being left behind, both physically and intellectually, but there they were, standing about or sitting on the edges of their cubbies, flashing one another glances, then turning back to 8XM, waiting for an explanation.
“Uh...with whom?” Skinny asked, kicking her legs over the edge of her top-row bunk. Her neighbor below was out on patrol, so her feet weren’t smacking into a face, this time...not that it had stopped Skinny before.
Under their collective gazes, 8XM frowned. “With Pearl. Oh man, wait, did I leak about Smokey Quartz already? I was saving that!” She crossed her arms, looking ready to steam off like a Ruby.
There was a steady murmur in the barracks. It was 8XM’s cut-sister, 8XL, who voiced one of the thousands of questions that Carnelian now found spinning in her head. “Wait. I’ve never heard of a Smokey Quartz. Is that some new Court gem?”
“Uh...no?” 8XM said, tilting her head. “It’s what happens when I fuse with—”
“Wait,” Skinny said, pushing off from her seat, falling gracefully to the floor and hitting with a ringing thud , which probably would have bent the metal on any of other, non quartz-reinforced surfaces of the ship. Her companions parted before her, more from courtesy than deference—there was no hierarchy between gems of the same type, except directly following tests of strength, and they hadn’t had one of those in about three days—so she never had to take her gaze off of the short amethyst who had been regaling them with tales of their lost home. “You...fused. With...the pearl?”
A darker purple came to 8XM’s lavender cheeks, and she took a long step back. Reaching up with a hand, she dug her fingers into the thick, nigh-unmanageable hair common to all quartz soldiers. “I...I mean, it was just...you know, to save Steven! We….” Amethyst looked, one by one, at the avid faces of her fellow quartzes. “We don’t...normally….”
The platoon waited. There was no movement in the crowd. No blinking. No conversation. Nothing.
8XM swallowed and let her hands fall back to her side, her gaze sinking to the floor. “Yeah. I...fused with Pearl.”
“My...stars.” Skinny breathed, covering her lips with steepled and interlaced fingers. “That is….”
8XM clenched her fists. Her gem glowed, slightly, just as any of the other amethysts in the room had done a thousand times over, as she prepared herself for the battle to come.
“AMAZING!” Skinny crowed, bouncing on the balls of her feet, turning to look at her companions. “I...I... that’s a thing?” She focused on one of the closer amethysts, reaching out to grab her forearm, standing on tip-toes to get into her face. “Did you know that was a thing? I...I’d never heard….” She spun back around to 8XM. “ Seriously? ”
Carnelian was glad Skins was being so...exuberant. Carnelian herself wasn’t too far behind, but this new thing, this idea...she needed to know . “Is this something only you can do? Fusing with gems of other types?” Carnelian kept her arms neutrally at her side, one hand in a fist, rubbing her thumb over forefinger, like she could work a groove into her physical form. “Is it because you were in the ground longer?”
The other amethysts, who had been displaying that growing tension that signalled a coming explosion of enthusiasm common to their type, all stilled once more, giving 8XM deep, seeking looks.
8XM snorted. “What? Nah, dudes. All of us can do that! Pearl and me, Pearl and Garnet, Garnet and me. Pearl AND Garnet AND me! And Ruby and Sapphire are fused, like, allllll the time. Heh...I used to find it kind of embarrassing, but you get used to it.” She laughed, rocking from heel to toe.
8XM watched, in glee, as her quartz sisters collectively lost their minds.
It was mostly a chaos of words. Most of the platoon had fused before. Well...everyone but Carnelian, really. Enough time alone on a ship, with plenty of gems your type, and of course there were going to be little experiments in fusion. There had been more than a few incidents during the first hundred years of exile when corridors had been damaged from ill-planned encounters. Even though Holly Blue Agate had technically forbidden the practice for four thousand years, it wasn’t uncommon to come back from patrol to find one or two enormous Amethysts having their hair braided by their smaller counterparts. A bit less common with their few Jaspers, but definitely still a thing.
But this? No. Never.
Carnelian threw her head back and screamed in joy. What she yelled may have made no sense to any outsider, but all of her sisters-in-arms grinned at their singular member’s explosive cry. “ Finally!”
To be fair...it wasn’t that simple. For one thing, just a minute after learning about this strange and glorious new ability, 8XM’s human traveling companions had arrived back at the barracks, and, of course, the platoon had to mess with them a bit. Their instructions for the zoo humans were so limited—strict nutritional guides, a schedule that went down to the minute, breeding projections set for over three thousand more generations, to avoid the strange weakening of the creatures that came from too-close mixing of their bloodlines—that being able to interact with them as if they were just...gems, or something like gems, was new and exhilarating.
And then Holly Blue arrived. And then the diamonds. And then came the battle on the concourse, with the little Sapphire and her Ruby melding together, creating a taller, faster, stronger gem. A kind which the zoo guardians had never seen before.
And then...8XM and the humans and her gem companions were gone. It took an hour of Holly Blue’s hissed threats and her subsequent groveling to the departing diamonds before any of the quartz soldiers had a chance to realize what had happened, and, more distressingly, what hadn’t happened.
In all the chaos, 8XM hadn’t had a chance to tell them the secret of this new fusion practice. Yes, they’d seen the brawler created from two unmatched gems, but it had been so quick, coming in the middle of Holly Blue’s attack. What little they were able to put together was soon proven useless; they knew that fusing across types was possible, and they all (but Carnelian) were in good practice at fusing within their gem type, but it seemed the two techniques were not at all related. The platoon knew that this strange and exciting mixing of their very selves was possible , but they had no idea how .
“I mean, how do we do it when we’re the same type?” One of the jaspers asked when they were all back in the barracks and doing their best to ignore the agate fuming up and down the halls outside. The large jasper—nothing close in size to the hero of the beta kindergarten, but well-matched to any of the amethysts of the platoon—was also pacing, though she seemed a bit calmer than her distant manager. Her feet described a large circle on the barrack’s floor, following a dingy groove which they had all walked at one time or another in the past millennium.
“I mean...we just...do?” An amethyst responded, turning to her sisters, who all nodded. “Like, we touch each other, and think about getting bigger, and we do?”
“Right,” the jasper said, halting her circuit of the barracks, turning to the amethyst that had answered her. “I mean, it has to be that simple, right? Come on.” She stepped forward, holding out a hand. “Let’s do it!”
Blushing furiously—not helped by the three other amethysts at her side, now slapping her back and hooting suggestively—the chip-toothed amethyst nodded, striding to the center of the room, where she met the jasper. The pair stood there, suddenly under the collective scrutiny of all their companions, their faces shifting to darker shades of yellow and lavender. There was marked hesitation between them, their fingers just a hair’s breadth from touching, their eyes locked. All around, cheers and jeers and encouragement rained down.
It was the amethyst who took the plunge, clapping her palm around the jasper’s forearm, gripping tight and eliciting a matching clutch at her own forearm.
They closed their eyes and waited.
The quartz soldiers held their breaths and watched.
A full minute passed before the jasper slit an eye open, looking down at her arm. Seeing another gem’s hand there, and not some...larger limb, instead, her eyes opened fully, and she frowned. “It didn’t work.”
Her amethyst companion also opened her eyes, looking at their clasped forearms in confusion. “But...that’s how it works.” She looked around. “Right?”
“That’s how it works when we’re the same gem,” Skinny spoke up, once more high up in her bunk. “If that’s all it took to fuse when we’re not the same gem, don’t you think we’d have done it sometime in the last five thousand years? I mean, I know there’s been some touching going on between a few amethysts and jaspers….” Skinny looked about, seemingly at no one in particular, but a little wave of blushes seemed to follow her gaze. “It’s got to be about more than just...contact. Right?”
Murmurs of agreement met this statement, and the amethyst and jasper in the middle of the room finally let one another go, muttering a few “thanks” and “it happens to a lot of gems” before going back to their companions.
“So, if it’s not like regular fusion...but 8XM said any gem should be able to do it...then what are we supposed to do?” Carnelian looked about at her companions. “What did that Ruby and Sapphire do that was different?”
Silence. Contemplation. Not exactly a normal state for any quartz soldier, and certainly strange for an entire platoon. If Holly Blue had walked in to see them all so still and thoughtful, she’d probably have dissipated her form from shock.
It was 8XJ who spoke up, her fingers still busy twirling her single curl. “I don’t think any of us really knows what was different. It could be one thing...it could be, like a hundred things those other gems are doing all the time!” She looked about at her companions, who all nodded. “How about, if anyone comes up with an idea, we just...try it out?”
Acquiescence came quickly. “Yeah.” “Sure.” “Makes sense to me.” “I’m game.” And a further dozen agreements. The oppressive atmosphere of the room lifted.
It wasn’t thirty seconds later that another amethyst high up on the wall called down, “Hey, Carnelian! I’ve got an idea! Let’s try to fuse!”
Carnelian blinked and looked up. She immediately noticed she was being watched by almost all of the dozen amethysts in the room. The ones not focused on her were instead looking at the three jaspers, and even cool Skinny seemed...suddenly rigid. Her hair fluffed up to another half its normal size, and she leaned back in her bunk, face almost lost in shadow.
“Uh...sure,” Carnelian muttered, stepping up to join the amethyst as she dropped to the floor. Carnelian waited, less patient and more nervous, as her fusion partner called another four gems into the mix before sending them all on a march to the station’s bay, where the six reenacted the escape scene like it was one of those “plays” put on by the pearls back on Homeworld. At the end, the amethyst stood beside Carnelian and reached out with her hand, only to recall her partner’s size and be forced down onto her knees to make the grip. And, a few seconds later...Carnelian was just standing there, holding an amethyst’s hand, as another four sets of eyes watched.
Nothing, of course. A few apologies and encouragements were passed around, and Carnelian was ready to turn and head back to the barracks, but, before she made it halfway to the doors, a different amethyst in the group had come up with a new idea, and Carnelian was dragged off to a private corner of the ship to try again.
And again.
Aaaaaaaaand again.
Ten hours later, Carnelian was being ushered back to the barracks for her...she didn’t know how many times she had tried this new type of fusion, but it was a lot. On her way, coming the opposite direction down the corridor, held in the arms of the chipped-tooth Amethyst, came a thin and exasperated gem.
Skinny met Carnelian’s eyes as they approached one another. “Hey,” she muttered, lifting a hand to her brow in the laziest salute in the cosmos. “Be strong,” she advised.
Carnelian sighed and returned the gesture. “Same to you, Skins.”
Then they were swept along in opposite directions, to be posed and prodded and directed for another few days straight. With absolutely no progress.
It was like that for weeks. Really, it was a wonder that any actual work got done. Certainly Carnelian and the base’s four Jaspers didn’t do much of it. Yes, the amethysts would back off when told, but Carnelian could only resist those big, sad eyes for so long before she allowed herself to be dragged into another experimentation session.
About the only time the crew wasn’t doing a test was in the presence of Holly Blue Agate, but she was being rather...stand-offish. How long that would last...well, no one was getting comfortable. Agates liked their positions of power, and Holly Blue had always been a bit pent-up, what with only having a dozen-and-a-half quartzes to bully.
But time went on. A second Choosening was held about a month after the first, and that one went off without any problems. One late-night visit from the medical droids a few weeks later and the next generation of humans was safely incubating, giving the crew plenty of time to overhaul the creche.
Carnelian’s excitement over the thought of cross-type fusion had long since been subsumed by her enthusiasm for the upcoming creche duties. In the first few generations of humans, the zoo’s infant care had taken a more utilitarian approach. The softest of surfaces to, precisely balanced nutrition, robot caretakers. The results had been...well, they’d had to request the Earth colony send another shipment of humans. Three times. Until, finally, the colonies sent back video of the humans in their natural environments.
Then policies changed, the creche was built, and the gems began incorporating quite counterintuitive elements in the care of the youngest humans. Harder surfaces to grab and push and bump into, even if it meant minor injuries. Occasional nutritionally empty foods, which were nonetheless chosen over proper meals every single time. And, to the delight of the crew, the robots were (mostly) retired, and the quartzes themselves were allowed into the creche to hold and soothe and croon over their charges. It was a duty totally mis-aligned with their warrior nature...and yet they enjoyed the one-third of the human’s lifespans where they could sit in the creche and let these strange, fragile creatures climb over their laps and backs and nestle into their hair, even if it did mean the occasional shower to rid themselves of accidents involving the humans’ digestive tract. Both...ends of the tract.
Carnelian and the other gems set themselves to the renovation with zeal. The walls were scrubbed clean and reprogrammed to a lighter green tinge—evocative of a peridot’s gem—instead of the previous generation’s cyan. Sensory stimulation tools were brought out of storage and evaluated for wear—Carnelian was pleased to find the plush figure she’d made in her own image was still holding strong at its seams—and sent through the sanitizer. Best of all, not just the normal two dozen, but twenty- six sleeping chambers were lined up along the walls. There was a celebration in the barracks the night that order came in, and J10’s next feeding was allowed a certain extra taste of sweetness.
It was joyous work. But also hard work. And that was why Carnelian so desperately wished that 8XJ would just...let her finish the textile sorting, instead of interrupting every five minutes with a new experiment!
“Okay, so, the idea is, you’ve got to match each other in size! So I’ll scrunch down some and you stretch some, and then we hold hands and—”
“Tried it,” Carnelian said from where she sat on the floor, tossing a lone foot-covering into a bin. Where in the world could the match have gone? It wasn’t a large ship, but there was always one missing….
“Oh...well, how about we try it in the ship bay? Could be a location—”
“Chip and Sharky had the same idea. No go.”
“Oh….” 8XJ twirled her curl around a finger, frowning. “Well, what about—”
“Twist. Stop.” Carnelian sighed, setting down the teeny undergarments she had been examining for holes, and turned about on her butt to look up, far up, at 8XJ. “We’ve all been trying for almost two months, now. I know it was exciting, at first, but we haven’t made any progress, and there’s a lot to do to get ready for the next generation of humans. So I think...I think we should just…just….”
8XJ was looking at Carnelian.
Looking at her, with those big amethyst eyes and with all that trust and hope and…
“I mean, you know...maybe for a day, or….”
Big eyes. Big, needing eyes.
“Or maybe an hour. Or….”
FWISH .
The creche doors slid open with the puff of equalizing pressure, stirring Carnelian and 8XJ’s hair and drawing their attention to the entryway. Both had a single, cold moment as they anticipated the presence of their blue leader and her always-sharp tongue and even sharper whip.
Instead of Holly Blue’s solid body and tight-bound hair, however, they were greeted by the light and wild figure of Jasper MG9, who, though she lacked the typical jasper build, was in the middle of showing she lacked none of the power as she set down a box by the doorway with an audible thud . Slapping her hands together and then down her front to brush off twenty years of dust, she cast a look in towards the pair of quartzes, settling on Twist. “Hey. Sharky needs some help with the replicators. Asked for you.”
Twist groaned, tossing her head so her voluminous hair bounced into place on her back. “Don’t tell me it’s the nitrogen balance, again. I told her, you give it an extra day and it all settles!”
“Hey, don’t ask me,” Skinny said with a shrug. “I’m just the messenger.”
“We have done this fifty times,” Twist muttered, storming out of the creche, her footsteps audible down the halls. “ Trust the system, Sharky! ”
Skinny watched her go, head tilted as the steps slowly faded into the distance. When all was relatively silent, but for the ever-present hum of the station’s systems, she smiled and reached out, thin fingers dancing over the door pad. “She does,” MG9 snickered, stepping back as the doors slid closed and the touch-pad was overlaid with the orange and blue mesh of her lock code.
Carnelian looked at the locked-down touchpad.
Then at Skinny, who was turning from the door and now observing her smallest quartz companion.
“H-hey, Skins, hold on,” Carnelian said, holding her hands up. “I was just trying to tell Twist that—”
“That the fusion thing is getting ridiculous and you want to just take a break? ” Skinny said, allowing her knees to fold under her, settling down on the box she had brought in. “Yeah. Same .”
Carnelian took a bit longer to process this than she cared to admit. But, once the words all came together and made sense, she let out a long sigh and a single, thin laugh. “Oh man...I thought...locking us in here….” She waved at the door.
Skinny followed the gesture, and then snapped her head back, a dark brown coming to her cheeks. “Oh! No!” She held out her arms, shaking her hands to fling the thought away. “Dude, no! Sorry! That’s to keep them out for a bit.”
“Man, could you imagine , after all the amethysts are doing, if you jaspers started ambushing everyone?” Carnelian snorted. And then dissolved into a fit of laughter that was more about exhaustion than actual amusement.
“Carn, if I’m ambushing someone, it’s for the old reason,” Skiny said, smashing her right fist into her left palm as an illustration. She looked down at her joined hands, frowning. “Man...I miss that , actually. I’m...tense.”
“Yeah, well, better get it out of your system before the replicators pop,” Carnelian said, sprawling out on the floor, letting her maroon hair pool on her back and forearms like a blanket. “Twenty-six humans, this time? Not going to be free too much for the next decade.”
“Ugh, you’re right,” Skinny moaned. “And four out of J10...you remember what she was like when she started walking?”
“I remember her escaping the creche and almost making it to the intake chamber,” Carnelian said. “Man...imagine if she’d got in with the previous generation. Craaaaaazyyyyyy.”
“Or that time she peed in Y6’s bed,” Skinny returned, snickering.
“Or when she swallowed that nutrition block whole and….” Carnelian’s words petered off at Skinny’s paling face, suddenly recalling who had been the one to notice the minor crisis in the creche. “I mean...she was okay, right? And we’ve dealt with that kind of thing before!”
“I know...I know,” Skinny said, nodding, though her lips were drawn down and her brows pinched together. “Just...it’s hard to decide which is better. When we’re all busy and kind of...worried, watching the humans….”
“Or when we’re all on our own?” Carnelian supplied.
A pause. Then the jasper nodded. “Yeah. It’s...I dunno. We weren’t...exactly made for this. Ya know? We just took over after the diamonds decided….” She went quiet, and all around them, they felt the presence of a hundred specialized gems, now housed within bubbles in a far off corner of the station, where only Holly Blue and the Diamonds could visit.
“Yeah,” Carnelian sighed. “But...we’re doing pretty good. Right?”
Skinny hesitated, then gave a small nod, along with a little smile. “Yeah. Just...got to get back into the routine.”
“Exactly!” Carnelian sat up. “And, look, if we’ve got to get into the routine again, soon, why not take the little time we have left to do what we want to do?” She stood, rising all the way to the tips of her toes before settling back onto her heels, reveling in the small burn of muscles limbering up.
Skinny raised a single brow, cocking her head and letting her eyes flick up and down Carnelian’s body. Speculating. “Yeah? And what do we want to do?”
“Well...I, for one, want to wipe the floor with your smug little face! ” Flicking her head to toss her hair over one shoulder, Carnelian settled her legs into a wide stance, her arms held up, muscles coming into sudden definition.
Skinny’s brows shot up nearly into her hairline. Then, a moment later, that “smug little face” took on an edged, focused look, eyes narrowed and lips pressed together. But Skinny didn’t rise from the box. She just held up her arms, palms to the ceiling, and crossed her legs. “If you insist , lil’ bit. Come at me.”
And Carnelian did. Oh, she did. It wasn’t just Skinny who had found her normal training time taken up by the fusion trials. Carnelian had almost forgotten the sweet crunch of fist into cheek-bone, and when she felt it again and watched Skinny flying back from the impact, over the edge of the box and into the wall behind, she grunted in relief. Good, good, so good. She paused at the edge of the box, just tall enough to peek over and see the sprawled form of Skinny on the floor.
Skins looked up at Carnelian, her left cheek turning a deep brown. She smacked her lips. “Wow. I am...impressed,” she drawled, gathering her long legs up under her, standing to her full height. Her body went through a long undulation, joints popping and muscles stretching until she settled, loose and ready. Looking down on the oddly short Carnelian, she bared her teeth in a traditional jasper smirk. “Heh...my turn.”
A second later, Carnelian landed on a pile of sorted baby clothes, socks flying into the air and settling down on her face. Her stomach ached and stars that felt right . “Hey. I think you’re improving!” She yelled across the creche.
“Why, thank you,” Skinny said, giving a low bow.
Before she could straighten up on her own, Carnelian did her the favor of assisting. Via a headbut to the jaw.
And then they were in earnest. Blankies flew and bottles skittered across the floor as the two pent-up quartzes clashed in the creche, undoing weeks of careful labor, but, man, whatever . The amethysts could fix it all up, because this was their fault, in the end, and whatever else they were tasked to do, this was what a quartz needed . They were soldiers. Weapons. And the best way they knew how to communicate was with a fist to the sternum and a foot to the gut.
A few minutes in, they grew a bit more coordinated, settling into more of a practiced spar than a desperate brawl. Luckily, nothing big had been broken—just a few stuffed toys shredded by one of Carnelian’s spin attacks and a box of bottles shattered when Skinny landed on top—but they took more care of their surroundings. And they took advantage of them. Carnelain slid under and darted around the amethyst-sized furniture, while Skinny slipped and danced between tight-packed boxes, hiding behind furniture and then sending it rocketing at her enemy with powerful kicks. Excepting the locked-down sleeping chambers, the room was soon completely rearranged, boxes opened and their contents flung as distractions, cabinet doors hanging wide, and all of the soft toys gathered and piled into a cushioned fortress, which provided absolutely no tactical advantage, but which the gems dove in and out of so swiftly it was a wonder it hadn’t yet collapsed during their intrusions.
They expected the beeping on the door lock that came a few minutes later, and ignored it. It would be a couple minutes before any of the quartzes could bypass Skinny’s lock code. Let Twist come in to see the chaos. Heck, let her join in! A third party to this dance would be just the extra challenge they all needed.
But the doors slid open far, far too soon for any of the quartz soldiers to be standing at the other side.
Holly Blue Agate looked in on the destruction and chaos of the ongoing battle. She didn’t even seem to need to breath in before she was screaming “WHAT ARE YOU IDIOTS DOING IN THIS CRECHE!?”
The battle stopped. In an instant. Carnelian stood, fist twisted around the upper hem of Skinny’s leggings, prepped for a gut punch. Skinny’s fingers were twisted in Carnelian’s hair, ready to slam the smaller gem’s face into her knee. Their uniforms were torn and dusty, their hair in disarray, and their skin darkened across a dozen earlier impacts. They smiled for just a second longer before their situation sunk in, and their lips fell.
“OUT!” Holly Blue screeched, already reaching a hand up to the back of her head, where her gem glowed. “GET OUT, AT ONCE! I HAVE NEVER SEEN SUCH DISRESPECT FOR THIS BASE! YOU TWO ARE ON FILTER CLEANING DUTY FOR THE NEXT DECADE, OUT OUT OUT!”
They took the hint just as Holly Blue’s whip formed. Scrabbling for purchase on the debris-strewn floor, the pair of fighters zipped out of the creche, Carnelian feeling the whisper of wind from a whip-strike on her neck as they slid through the doorway and turned the corner to flee down the hall. Further screams followed their retreat, but by then they were away, safe, and they were laughing. Laughing and running just to run, because the tension was gone and they were the gems they were made to be and damn but a split lip and a black eye felt good .
They made for the barracks and arrived with impeccable timing, the doorway whooshing open when they were just a few seconds away. Nearly taking up the entire entryway was Sharky and Twist, both scowling, bickering to one another, trying to step through at the same time, leaving just a small gap between their wide shoulders.
Carnelian started to pull up to avoid a crash, but Skinny laughed, reaching out and grabbing her sparring partner’s hand, pulling her along behind. With a tight and elegant spin, the jasper slipped between her amethyst companions, ushering Carnelian along behind her, into the barracks, to the center of the floor, where she took both of Carnelians hands, continuing the spin. Their sudden combined momentum lifted Carnelian off her feet, and she crowed at the feeling of flight, letting Skinny hold her hands tight and swing her through the air, until her head felt fuzzy and her body warm and the world was awash in light.
And Citrine stood before the crew of amethysts and the remaining two jaspers, laughing and throwing her four hands in the air.
There was only a moment of stunned silence in the barracks. Then all of the quartzes were screaming, cheering, rushing to Citrine, throwing their arms around her long, tightly-muscled legs, jumping and throwing fists in the air as if it were their victory, as well.
And, well...they were a platoon. Of course it was their victory. It always was.
It took a few more weeks to understand what had happened. Long enough for a few teeth to get knocked out as the barracks doors were opened just a few seconds too late and running quartz soldiers slammed into the wall, rather than spinning into the room and setting themselves aglow. But, one by one, they worked it out. First an amethyst and a jasper melding into a new gem who announced herself as Tiger Eye. Then Carnelian and Twist, overlooking the sleeping humans, nuzzled together, closing their eyes peacefully and opening them as Fire Opal. Then came experimentation with double-amethysts and a jasper, double-jaspers and Carnelian, and over and over until Sharky actually drew up a chart and they began to fill it in, the barracks full of melding, glowing gems and laughter and bent walls as they realized that maaaaaaybe they should try the bigger combos somewhere a bit more...spacious.
It was another month before Holly Blue Agate ran across any of the fusions—Citrine, as it happened—for the first time. The combined gem was just enjoying a little time as herself, walking from the barracks to the station’s maintenance tunnels, singing a little song. In the same moment, Citrine turned right around a corner and Holly Blue turned left, coming from the opposite direction, and Holly Blue’s face slammed into Citrine’s stomach.
“Oh, sorry, Holly Blue,” Citrine said, patting the little agate’s head, the force of the blow dislodging half of the managerial gem’s hair from its tight bun. “You okay? Can’t stop to chat. I’ve got to clean out those filters.” And then, with a swish in her wide hips, amplified by the thin waist that Skinny had brought into the mix, they continued down the hall through a doorway, and made their way deep down into the station.
Skinny and Carnelian were taken off their punishment detail, after that. Perhaps Holly Blue thought they needed a bit...less time together.
Of course, it didn’t stop the frequent fusion. Not theirs or any of the other pairings. But if everyone became a bit more careful about doing it when Holly Blue was around...well, she was their manager. It was best to keep the flagrant fraternization to a minimum.
And, besides, six months later, the replicators popped, and there were suddenly twenty-six new humans in the creche, eating and pooping and crying and generally doing their damndest to somehow injure themselves, despite the constant attention of an entire platoon of quartz soldiers. It was all hands on deck, and the fact was, in the confines of the creche, fused hands were not all that useful.
They decided to keep the fusion to a minimum around the babies. At least until they got the idea of object permanence. And then...oh man. They were going to play the most epic game of peek-a-boo ever.