Believe in Steven!

(( I can make no promises about tonight because its after 3 am but would anyone want to start something new with me..? I know I’ve been very slow, partly because I haven’t been very well lately. Recently my motivation to get out of bed has been fading, much less my motivation to try and be happy go lucky as Steven on here but. Its also because I feel like my writing has stagnated.

Most of my partners have deleted or gone inactive, and it seems that most new blogs already have running things with Stevens. My few threads are getting repetitive which is making my writing quality slide, and… I dunno. It doesn’t seem like most people want to write with me a lot anymore, and the few that do request it don’t read my rules.

Please don’t tell me everything is wonderful now.

[Inspired by the chorus of the song Wonderful by Everclear]

Set right after Lapis is finally free? I wanted to draw this after we actually get to see it, but I couldn’t wait that long.

I can’t imagine anyone being okay after going through everything Lapis has. Her gem being cracked and imprisoned in a mirror for thousands of years, finally going home just to see everything has changed and immediately imprisoned again… and then being forced to fuse and trapped on Earth yet again (even if she did take control, Jasper didn’t give her much of a choice)…

It’s too much.

Send “No more tears” to discover my muse sobbing

⌈

@rebornquartz​

           ◈ѕтєνєη/нувяι∂ ¢υв◈

   Only with the companion of the orange skies in the Battlefield dimension and besides one of the big statues that lied on the pillars, the digital Pearl left her pixelated tears abandon their luminous white eyes. Her voice accompained the act with accidental sobbing, but she simply didn’t mind. Who would be around at those hours? It was, even, ridiculous.

   Short and fast steps made echoe in the vast silence. She looked at her surroundings, finding nothing. Her sobs stood slipping, she was too clumsy to hide.

«Purple One?   C r e a t–(It cannot be Creator)» She inquiried, then correcting herself when she was about to say the second name.

   Approval was hard objective to reach. Holopearl understood that the right pathway to redemption required time, and patience. At simple sight, such challenge was going to be easy. Gems would see who the virtual Pearl was and she’d surely be another one of the family. However, she didn’t count with all the awkward moments and bitter situations that would be clung to her way. Obstacles, that caused cracks on her emotional being.

   Late days have consumed the hologram at all. She wasn’t only acting clumsy during her nervous mood, impulsed by nightmares projected on her memory banks while she engaged the sleep mode; with every mistake done, including Pearl seemed to act distant at her.

   (Or, at least, that’s what she could process. Her fears were such that to still struggling with this all were dragging her to a deep abyss whose exit reached the domains of the impossible).

   She left then. Hopefully, nobody would realize she was lacking. In the best of the cases, somebody would simply say ‘everything’s so quiet…’ and the entire conversation would die there.

     (The digital doll didn’t realize about Steven.   Not until he found her).

   It was then, when his soft voice sounded again, nearer. It was comforting, an umbrella in the middle of the storm. A feeling of protection has taken control on the holographic gem. She could relax her tense body, to let all their pixelated tears to form into the air to be embraced by the gentle whispers of the wind; but, she has chosen to curl up, to applicate a bigger tension on her body, to bury her fine nose on her legs, to rub her gem against her knees, to contain her cry, the loud amount of strength that accumulated on her vulnerable chest.

   She kept like this, silently, ignoring he was around. The pression her body was making, the intense ache on her head and all those confusing situations has distorted their thoughts, to the point to ignore the limits between reality and a subjective parallel personal experience, independent of what was really happening.

(Such instance made her believe Steven just left.   Possibly to ask for help to Pearl?)

Her head separated from her legs, their arms still wrapping around them though, quickly their white blank eyes pointed behind. He was still here. He spoke again.

Concern, such an abstract conception were completely reflected on the other’s eyes. His gaze, so pure and innocent darting at the one that once has unchained a torturing suffering on him, and their friends as well.

(Regret was starting to crawl on the unstable fibers of her skin).

«I am wrong…     I am hopeless…

(I am starting to think I cannot be good at other thing that would not be dueling—)» She broke in the last words, curling up again as she started to cry loud, her shoulders finally shaking violently.

          It wasn’t that Lapis couldn’t speak, she just refused to. Not even Steven could convince her to open her mouth and talk. But, well, she was willing to write.

          The ocean gem hesitated before taking the pen in her hand and turning the paper to face her. She struggled a moment– not being very familiar with the written English language– before jotting down two words in a messy scrawl.

          She shook her head rapidly as he spoke– no, no, this was all wrong, this wonderful and loving little boy shouldn’t think that all there was to him was to be a shield. She hated that he was causing him this much stress just because she couldn’t keep her own emotions and breakdowns in check– she was convinced that she was a horrible person, a horrible friend, because of it.

            Lapis was, perhaps, a bit overwhelmed as well as emotionally unstable– she wasn’t used to being loved and cared about, as she hadn’t been genuinely wanted since before the war when everything went to hell. She wished she could make things better, make everything she’d just caused go away forever, but she couldn’t bring herself to talk.

             As tears streamed down her face, she tried in vain to wipe them away with the heel of her hand and force herself to calm down and stop. She’d never cried in front of anyone before, much less Steven, preferring to keep it bottled up until she was alone in some shipwreck and could let it all out without bringing a sledgehammer to everything she’d tried to build up in her time in the mirror. She was supposed to be strong, and angry, and she definitely wasn’t supposed to cry and have a breakdown with her only friend there to witness it.

              And then she felt a warm weight against her, and was stunned momentarily– upon opening her eyes and blinking her way through the haze that tears had left her with, she realized that he was hugging her. Lapis didn’t know how to react at first, had absolutely no clue how to respond to receiving comfort and affection and kindness after all but forgetting the time she’d spent outside of captivity and being a ‘member’ of the Crystal Gems.

               Slender arms quickly wrapped around Steven and held him tightly, a choked sob forcing its way past her throat as she bit down a wail. She was crying harder now, letting it all out like he said it was okay to. Being a gem that thrived off of saltwater, she had a lot more tears to shed than a human or a normal gem– and it probably showed.

               “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry–”

                She couldn’t talk right through the sobs and her constricted throat, but she gave it her best shot, apologizing rapidly.

hivaeth:

          She shook her head rapidly as he spoke– no, no, this was all wrong, this wonderful and loving little boy shouldn’t think that all there was to him was to be a shield. She hated that he was causing him this much stress just because she couldn’t keep her own emotions and breakdowns in check– she was convinced that she was a horrible person, a horrible friend, because of it.

            Lapis was, perhaps, a bit overwhelmed as well as emotionally unstable– she wasn’t used to being loved and cared about, as she hadn’t been genuinely wanted since before the war when everything went to hell. She wished she could make things better, make everything she’d just caused go away forever, but she couldn’t bring herself to talk.

             As tears streamed down her face, she tried in vain to wipe them away with the heel of her hand and force herself to calm down and stop. She’d never cried in front of anyone before, much less Steven, preferring to keep it bottled up until she was alone in some shipwreck and could let it all out without bringing a sledgehammer to everything she’d tried to build up in her time in the mirror. She was supposed to be strong, and angry, and she definitely wasn’t supposed to cry and have a breakdown with her only friend there to witness it.

              And then she felt a warm weight against her, and was stunned momentarily– upon opening her eyes and blinking her way through the haze that tears had left her with, she realized that he was hugging her. Lapis didn’t know how to react at first, had absolutely no clue how to respond to receiving comfort and affection and kindness after all but forgetting the time she’d spent outside of captivity and being a ‘member’ of the Crystal Gems.

               Slender arms quickly wrapped around Steven and held him tightly, a choked sob forcing its way past her throat as she bit down a wail. She was crying harder now, letting it all out like he said it was okay to. Being a gem that thrived off of saltwater, she had a lot more tears to shed than a human or a normal gem– and it probably showed.

               “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry–”

                She couldn’t talk right through the sobs and her constricted throat, but she gave it her best shot, apologizing rapidly.

There was a brief heartbeat of something like limbo, a moment in which Lapis was completely tensed and stiff and Steven was overwhelmed with the cushing fear that he had done the exact wrong thing to do. For a second his heart stopped, and he almost drew away, almost yanked is arms from around her and tried to apologize for not asking, for grabbing her, for thinking that something as silly as a hug could possibly help anyone but him…  And then she was hugging him back. Not just hugging him, even, it felt as though she were clinging to him like her life depended on it. The way she clutched him felt as though she intended to remain there forever, never letting him go, and in this moment he was perfectly alright with that. He wondered if she’s had a hug since she’d been in the mirror, or even before then. How long had it been since someone had been truly affectionate to her…? The question made him tighten his grip a bit, and he chose not to ask. Probably not ever..

He held her even as he felt tears begin to soak into his shirt, pouring forth as if she had the entire ocean pent up inside her, while he just snuggled a little closer. One small hand rubbed her back in a soothing motion, his face pressed into her shoulder as she cried. And he let her cry. He had already decided that he would gladly sit here with her until she was done; if she needed to sit and cling to him and sob all night long he would wait it out with her. With all the internalizing she did, Lapis honestly probably needed the chance to not be strong for once. He was just honored to be the one she so trusted.

“It’s okay Lapis, it’s okay, it’s okay.” For every apology she managed to choke out, he answered with the same soft reassurance. It was okay. It was okay for her to cry, it was okay that Blue Diamond had called, they would find a way to best her. True to the nature of his optimism, Steven truly and utterly believed that despite the odds everything would somehow be alright, and so he told her so. As it went though, his reassurance changed a bit, no longer quite as repetitive.

She didn’t understand what was going on with herself other then the fact that she couldn’t full stop. There was a pain that she hadn’t felt before and holding onto her leg and looking to the voice. This was the first time the small gem had fallen from Steven’s room to the floor below.

Her list of injuries was longer than he initially expected; Steven had been so surprised by finding her that he’d managed to overlook how badly wounded she was. Now that he was up close, and she was pointing it out, he could see better how extensive her wounds actually were, and there sure were a lot of them. Not many looked especially serious, mainly scrapes and bruises and small cuts, but there were a couple of larger ones in the mix. This was gonna take a lot of spit.