So far though, it seemed like he was good. Even Kiddo didn't look at him, but that might just be because he's so focused.

Twoie needed to just let events play out. This needed to happen, or Peridot might not give up. If she thinks she has a chance to stop the cluster herself, or to escape the planet on her own, then all may be lost.

So far so good, events were lining up exactly as they had before. Stumbling across Peridot, the resulting conflict, her subsequent escape, and Pearl and Amethyst leaving to go find her while he stayed behind with Garnet.

"... If Peridot's mission was to reactivate the Kindergarten, the injectors would be on. But they are not" Said Garnet to his younger self.

"Oh, oh" said Kiddo.

Garnet picked up the collapsed injector, revealing a hole.

"Let's go see what she was actually doing"

Garnet, Kiddo, and Twoie went down into the Kindergarten's prime control room.

But only Twoie knew what horrors would await them.

Empathic projection would always terrify him. It, like mind control, took people's freedom from them. Unlike mind control however, it couldn't be controlled well enough to simply ignore. Twoie had to choose to mind control someone, and it was a hard thing to maintain. He had to put an active effort into not spreading his emotions to all around him.

Plus, it was pretty hard for mind control to hurt him. Empathic projection, before he realized it was there, can and has hurt directly. It had its good points, but its bad ones nearly ruined his life (though part of that was his fault).

Now though, he needed to use it, and he need to do it right. Folding laundry helped, mainly because it kept eyes off him as he practiced and caused people to not notice his screw ups.

What he was trying to do is project a sense of disinterest toward him around himself. This should cause people to not consider him, especially Gems due to their weakness to psychic infiltration. If he messed up, he'd most likely project a feeling of boredom, hence why he was doing this while everyone was folding laundry.

He needed to do this because he couldn't mess up this mission. Timing was important, and if his team mates were thinking about him and what he would do, that timing could be messed up.

He hummed as he worked, while singing wasn't important to empathic projection, making deliberate noise was. It was essentially a variation on the naturally transitive properties of the Gem language. Using noises to directly project meaning, rather than the noises themselves having inherent meaning.

It wouldn't effect Kiddo of course, as a Diamond he had quite a bit of resistance to this type of attack, further accentuated by Kiddo being psychic in his own right. Worse, his younger self might be able to sense that he's doing it, and that might mess things up. All he could was trust that Kiddo won't try and make things harder on him.

About halfway through the laundry session, Garnet began to speak.

"We need to track down Peridot. We found her pod. We know she's out there somewhere. She came to Earth with a job to do and odds are, she's still gonna try to do it. That's why I've gathered you here."

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

(Yes, this is basically filler. I overslept).

It had been a few days after Connie's training had started. Excited to learn as well, Steven had asked Twoie to teach him how to use his Gem, Twoie had deflected. Choosing to cite not wanting to lose control of the situation as his reason.

So, Twoie suggesting they do it less than 10 minutes before Connie's arrival was a little weird.

"I thought you said that we couldn't do that?"

Twoie shrugged with a smile, he seemed excited.

"Yeah, but then I had a lot of trouble remembering too many instances where that happened, and I think I can just tell you what is SUPPOSED to happen. I can trust you"

That made Steven feel overwhelmed. People didn't trust him, not even he trusted him, but Twoie did? That was odd.

Twoie looked saddened, a pout creeping onto his face.

"I forgot I used to be like that you know"

"Like what?" Steven said, confused.

Twoie turned away and didn't answer, then shook his head.

"Let's go to the sky arena, better to start earlier rather than later" he said.

And with that very obvious deflection, Twoie and Steven warped away.

The cloud arena, the place where she first fused, had been completely empty at the time of the attack. Due to it's location, it, and most of the other floating Gem buildings, were completely free of corrupted Gems. They were too close to a warp pad to be caught in it.

The last time she was here was to destroy it's Diamond communicator, and hadn't really thought about it since. What could be here that could help her with her future vision?

"So" Twoie said, stepping off the warp pad. "I am sure you are wondering why we are here?"

Garnet nodded in agreement.

Twoie smiled.

"It was just because it was the last place anyone would go accidentally. There are, reasons, to keep this covert"

Garnet had to think about this. Twoie didn't want to be interupted, nor did he want anyone else to know they were doing this. That was slightly suspicious.

"Why do you want to keep this a secret?" She asked.

Twoie, instead of responding normally, took a deep breath, and stuck out his hand.

"May I have this dance?"

That... explained a lot. Garnet knew how excited Twoie's younger self could be around fusions, especially new ones, and even without her future vision she could see why he might want to avoid that.

She took his hand in hers, and their gems started glowing. A song filled the air around them, and Twoie led her into a very simple dance. As it finished twoie spun into her and they combined.

It was a lot quicker than Garnet had expected, and whoever they were now had got to have been the shortest three gem fusion Garnet had ever "seen". Of course, as the process completed, Ruby and Saphire found themselves in the mindscape, with Garnet no where to be found.

The fact that they were already in the fusion mindscape was a little weird, sense that generally only happened when a fusion was in a state of great focus. Looking around, they found Twoie, just standing around with his thumbs in his pockets.

They couldn't find the fusion anywhere, normally while in a focused, mentally separated, state like this, all parts of a fusion mind would be present. But they couldn't find any other figures.

Twoie saw the confusion and looked at them, and pointed up.

Following his finger, they saw a massive butterfly descending as the fusion took form, finally resting on the mirror like surface that made up the fusion mindscapes floor.

The butterfly showed the sky arena, tinted red. They realized that this wasn't a memory, or even a vision, it was what the fusion was seeing now. If in slow motion due to them moving at the speed of thought.

However, as they all focused on the image, it sped up to normal time. And the fusion started to speak, likely only moments after it had properly formed.

"Awwww YEAH, It's been a while!"

Ruby and Saphire were both shocked. They couldn't hear the fusions thoughts, they could only see and hear what it did.

This broke their focus and they looked at Twoie, who, without looking away from the screen, answered their silence.

"This is what normally happens with Sunstone. Can't hear their thoughts, can't influence their actions. I am honestly not even sure she can hear us back here"

Ruby and Saphire stared back at the screen, and caused it to go back to normal speed.

"A Future Vision Problem? Well, I got you Garnet. It's going to be Just fine!"

Sunstone's giant hands pulled something from an orange, flaming portal. A clipboard, seemingly the one Twoie had Garnet write the rejection letter to Jamie in, came out.

And with that, Sunstone just began writing. She wrote down a time, a date, a location, and a description of what's going to happen. It wasn't very comprehensive, but it was alot more than Garnet had gotten.

After nearly thirty minutes, and three sheets of paper of writing. Sunstone set down the clipboard.

"Well then, I hope that's cool enough for yah, G-Squad. Talk to me again if you think you need more"

Then, with out any warning at all, Sunstone unfused. It took a decent bit of work for Ruby and Saphire to stay fused through this, but not more than poofing Sugilite had.

Garnet stood across from Twoie when the process ended. Then she walked over and picked up the clipboard. She saw that Twoie had taken a seat rather than heading toward the warp pad. She stuffed the clip board in Saphires gem for safe keeping and review, then sat next to him.

"So, I am sure you have some questions?" He said.

"Many"

All in all, it was a confusing and frustrating day, one he wanted his younger self not to have to deal with it. Now, how to do that...

Twoie pushed his mind into super speed to give himself more time to think. It resulted in him feeling like he was frozen, but he'd done it plenty of times before. So while it was uncomfortable, he was used to it.

His first thought was a polite dismissal, but he quickly shut that down. No way it would work forever, and it was too unpredictable as a solution.

It was a hard thing, he didn't want to hurt anyone, but he didn't want to let his younger self be hurt more than strictly necessary.

He might be overthinking this. Twoie was a Diamond, it is in his nature to manipulate others, but he's also a human. Human nature is to go against their nature when it doesn't serve them. It's what allowed him not to be just another cog in the machine.

It meant that the first thing he needed to ask himself is does this really need fixing? Sure, Kiddo would likely be hurt by it, and it didn't make him stronger for the experience. But did that mean he shouldn't go through it? People are the some of their experiences, did Twoie have the right to take that experience away?

In truth, no. But that wasn't what he was doing here, he wasn't taking an experience away, he was just making an experience with his younger self. That is something he does have right to, making a memory with another person.

All he had to do now was make it a positive memory.

That was the hard part. Twoie was decent at talking his way out of things, he knew a few tricks in that direction, but Ronaldo was equally good at not being tricked. The Frymen was adapt at keeping his mind open to possibilities and looking at things from more than one angle. More to the point, he was a minor grade psychic. If he suspected anything then simply talking wouldn't work.

However, between Ronaldo's minor precognition, and his very open and outrospective mind, it should make him fairly weak to psychic influence. Specifically, it would make him open to psionic suggestion.

That did present a moral issue. Psionic suggestion was a form of mind control, and while Twoie wasn't entirely against manipulating that minds of others, there was a certain amount of morality needed to do that properly.

He might need to just let this one slide on Ronaldo's part. Twoie didn't think he had the moral backbone to be able to do that to Ronaldo without hurting either him or himself.

Twoie went back into Normal time, and took a deep breath. He wasn't strong enough to fix this, it had been a long while sense he felt that.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

(Yeah, Twoie DID just fully consider mind control as a potential solution to the problem, what of it).

(Also, this is a one off, "Rising tides, Crashing Skies" continues mainly as normal. With Twoie standing in the background at points and comforting Steven).

Twoie stopped reciting the unfamiliar tune, and looked at him. Then he winced.

"Uh, something I probably shouldn't have been. You know, due to future knowledge" Twoie stroked his chin as he thought. "Honestly, I can't think of a reason why I couldn't tell you some of that story? Especially sense it IS one of the things that I plan to change"

Steven felt excitement well up inside him, he did like it when Twoie talked about the future, though he rarely ever did.

Twoie saw his excitement and began talking.

"Okay, So six thousand or so years ago, there was a Gem by the name of... I actually probably shouldn't tell you. Anyway, She used to work with someone who would become really important to the Crystal Gems" Twoie took a deep breath, his eyes closing in a wince. Steven didn't think he liked this part.

"So, when the Gem that the Gem that made this song left to go work on Earth, she left the other Gem. The did not leave on exactly the best of terms, putting things very, VERY lightly. It might have actually been better if they attacked each other, it was so bad"

Steven felt slightly scared, and really wanted to skip forward in the story, this seemed kinda sad.

"Um, what does this have to do with the song you were humming?" He asked, in an effort to deflect.

Twoie chuckled darkly before answering.

"That! Well, eventually the Gem who wrote that found out what happened to her "friend", and came to get her revenge. The Gem that hurt her was gone, but they were a Crystal Gem. So she decided to take it out on us. She worked in entertainment, singing, juggling, that kinda thing. When she fought us, a fight we nearly lost totally, she sung"

Twoie paused, then smiled at Steven in an effort to relieve his nervousness.

"We did eventually get her to calm down, and no one was permanently hurt in the process. So, you know, happily ever after and all that, not that that kind of thing really happens"

Steven let go of a breath he didn't know he was holding, Twoie didn't seem to like that Story, but maybe they could stop it. Twoie said he was going to anyway. Steven only had one question.

"What's it called?" He asked.

Twoie raised an eyebrow in confusion, then stifled a laugh.

"Oh, you meant the song! Got confused there for a second. Uh, she called it "Other Friends"" Twoie calmed down after a bit. "You know, if we grab a couple of instruments we could do a rendition of it. If all goes well you'll never hear it otherwise, and I don't remember it being too spoilery"

Steven nodded excitedly, he liked music, and the song, the hummed version at least, seemed good.

So, they went of to gather some musical instruments.

===============================

Garnet came out of her room, and Twoie realized something.

"Hey Garnet? Can I ask you something?" He said.

"Sure, Twoie. What is it?" She said, sitting next to him.

"Has your future vision been working since I arrived?"

"Not in the slightest"

Twoie winced and turned away at her response.

"Um, sorry"

"Why did you ask?" She said.

Twoie gave her a side ways glance.

"My timeline's Garnet had her future vision stop working on me when I was 14. It occurred to me that sense I was from a timeline you couldn't see, that you might not have been able to use your future vision as of late"

Garnet thought about for a second, that really did make sense. Twoie seemed happy, and Garnet didn't see that many timelines where that happened, and in none of them did he show the powers he showed here. Steven was hard to predict on a good day, after seven years, who knows what. Clearly not her.

"Would you like some help with that?" He asked.

Garnet was confused, she wasn't doing anything right now. It took her a second to realize he was offering her help with her future vision.

"What do you have in mind?"

Twoie quickly finished his cereal, and hopped onto the warp pad.

"You'll see, I think you'll like it"

Of course, Steven's natural response to panic is to just suck it up and not mention it until it got too bad to really repair. So he didn't relay this to Connie. Not that she didn't know he was panicked about something. Soon, she began panicking about his panicking in a death spiral that only began to loosen it's grip on them when the pink dome suddenly vanished.

Pearl and Twoie both had neutral looks on their faces. That lasted until they saw their panicked expressions and Pearl looked questioningly at Twoie, who in turn looked like he was trying to hold in a laugh.

Pearl shook her head with a sigh and then looked at Connie. Then, returning yo a neutral expression, she spoke.

"Connie, I'd be happy to teach you to swordfight. Let's meet tomorrow for it? Does that work for you?"

Connie nodded, and Pearl walked off.

"What did you guys even talk about?" Steven said to Twoie.

It was an interesting question. They weren't under that dome for very long, only about five minutes, so they it couldn't have been anything substantial.

Clearly still trying to stop himself from laughing, Twoie answered.

"Oh, I recounted basically the next two weeks, moment for moment" Twoie interrupted himself with giggles

"What's so funny?" Steven asked.

Twoie laughed, and then shook his head. He proceeded to not explain and walk out of the house. Steven and Connie ran after him.

"WAIT!!! You forgot to explain! We want to hear the funny thing!" They yelled as they too left the house.

<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>

(I was originally going to show the rest of Twoie and Pearl's journey through the mindscape, but it just ended up being incessantly boring. So I cut it and skipped over to Steven and Connie. I don't think any of us want to see twenty updates of recap without actually continuing the plot or charecter arcs.)