#makorraspringproject

 W-wha…?

What happened?

Why is everything so… short?

“Aqua… Are you o--?” Zircon cut himself off, shocked at the new sound he made.

“I'm… I feel… Huh?” Aquamarine blinked a few times, glancing around at their surroundings. Still at the beach. Freshly-made glass shooting upwards from the sand a little ways from them and signs of struggle near the cliff, but still the beach. And yet… something was… off. “Zircon--”

“Is that you?” Zircon interrupted their in shock and slight panic. He crawled toward the shoreline, exhausted from the previous argument. “Or is that…”

“Me?”

Silence floated above them as they stared into the water, the rippling silhouette of a curvaceous feminine figure with long, shaggy hair seeming to be staring back. The figure stood as stiff as they did…

Almost as if...

“Aqua! What the hell?! Did you just--?!”

Aqua scowled grimly. “Me?! You did this!”

An angry yet shocked look crossed Zircon’s face. “But I did nothing!”

As they went back and forth, they managed to stumble toward the glass in the sand. They each peered into it to see their reflection.

The reflection they encountered was the same feminine figure, but in full detail. Their hair was almost a clear white with messy streaks of pale blue, their skin holding the same shade of blue. They wore a grayish-white dress with a few ragged holes in it. The only thing that stood out were their eyes, which were a dark blue with clear flecks of reddish-brown. An aquamarine gem was settled on their sternum and a zircon gem was underneath her right wrist.

“This is us…” Aqua awkwardly lifted a hand to touch the warm glass, her reflection wearing the same expression of disbelief. “What… happened…?”

The last fifteen minutes seemed like a blur before, but now everything started coming back to them; Aquamarine and Zircon were screaming at each other… Aqua accidentally blasted a hole into their makeshift home they fit into the rocky caverns on the beach. Zircon blew up at Aqua for ruining the only materials for proper shelter they had. She barked back just as boldly, icy blue eyes burning into fiery orange. They got into each other's faces, one just as loud as the other... Zircon was the one to notice the rocks that tilted haphazardously from Aqua’s blast finally cave in, barreling toward them… Instinct drove him to push her out of the way, then a flash of white light appeared between and around them. Then… nothing.

“Zircon… Did we…? What… what are we?” Aqua pressed her hand to either side of her head.

Zircon closed their eyes and exhaled, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Calm down. We’re a fusion--”

“You say it like it's normal!” Aqua cut her eyes at him, shocked contempt flashing behind her irises as her fists clenched. “Fusions aren’t exactly a welcome guest! On top of that, we’re on a mission! We are not supposed to be… this!” She motioned to their new form.

He frowned in annoyance, his arm falling to his side. “No, we aren’t,” he sighed. “We have to get to Nephrite; she'll fix this--”

“How?! The city’s packed with elite corps soldiers! We’re never gonna get through like this!”

“We will if you just follow my lead.”

“Why your lead?” Aqua raised a brow in distaste.

“Because you obviously aren’t the most levelheaded about this.”

“I am levelheaded!”

They clumsily got to their feet as they argued back and forth, but it proved unfruitful as their lack of focus caused them to plop back down in the sand. Right… They were sharing legs now.

Zircon let out a long sigh and stared into the sky. “Aqua… I can't believe I'm saying this, but we're gonna have to work together on this.”

Aqua’s eyes narrowed in annoyance, though a patch of light pink tinged their cheeks. “Urgh… Fine.”

With that, they got to their shared knees and began to unsteadily balance on them as they rose off their bottom. They planted one of their feet on the ground, then two, and rose their bottom upwards as they straightened their legs. With a grunt, they pushed against the sand and got to their feet, where they began to tremble, and Aqua started to panic at the lack of total control she had to prevent tipping over.

“Relax, just relax,” Zircon murmured. “Just work with me, okay?”

Aqua took a deep breath and followed his movements carefully. They soon stopped trembling and stood straight. They sighed and threw their arms out and then upward to stretch.

“Alright, now that we’ve gotten standing up out of the way, what about walking?” Aqua asked.

“Huh…” Zircon looked down at his feet, staring hard as if they’d move on their own if he did. “Uh… Let’s try right foot... Right…” He managed to wiggle the toes on said foot. “... foot…”

They both lifted the foot, wobbling briefly before bringing it forward. “Ha…” They did the same with their left foot, their eyes lighting up at the successful attempt. “Haha! We’re doing it!” Aqua exclaimed.

Zircon’s excited grin faded into a curious, yet focused one. “Okay, we’re getting somewhere. Just keep it up. Right, left, right--”

Aqua scoffed. “I know how to walk, Zircon!”

Zircon simply rolled his eyes. “Yeah, but we don’t. Just bear with me so we can get the hang of it.”

“True…”

They began walking forward steadily, stumbling and falling a few times. After several tries walking back and forth along the shore, they perfected their walk enough to look like they knew what they were doing.

“Alright,” Aqua huffed in satisfaction. “Next phase?”

“Swimming to the docks?”

“Lovely.”

_________________________

Nephrite sifted through the panels of her holographic logbook, boredom finally catching up to her as much as her officers. It was a slow day; the city that was normally so restless was now in a stagnant state of calm. There were no emergencies as of late and the only time there was a call was when one of the topazes she put on city patrol updated her on the current state of the borders or a bismuth asking if the new metal cord gauntlets sent for her officers were up to par or if they needed some work.

She definitely wasn’t used to this. She even silently hoped something outrageous like a breach would happen soon.

She sighed and continued going through her panels. The logbook was full of images of prosecuted gems either fusions or gems in direct contact from Homeworld, about fifty on each panel and each gem with their current status below their image. The glowing workspace blurred before her as she swiped a finger to the left, eyes skimming over the statuses. Most of them held a flashing red stamp spelling out “SHATTERED” in block letters. Some had a yellow stamp spelling out “POOFED” and indicated court trial dates.

Nephrite wasn’t too fond of the majority being red stamps, but it wasn’t her place to object.

A small green blur caught her eye and she stopped the panels for a moment to look at the gem associated with it. There was a single green stamp amongst the red and yellow, spelling out “LEGALIZED”. Above this stamp was a picture of a zircon, sneering at the camera. Nephrite let out a small chuckle at the image, her mind tracing back to the day it was taken.

***

The camera’s flash consumed half of the mostly empty room, possibly blinding the poor zircon whose picture was being taken. Although she… he tried to play it off with a deeper scowl, Nephrite noticed he blinked a few times so his eyes could adjust. The amethysts who had him by the forearm jerked him away from the camera and pulled in front of Nephrite.

He clearly put up a fight, she thought to herself, seeing as the two amethysts struggled a bit to hold him still. Strong for an off-color…

Off-colors were gems who had a trait or more that made their natural function near impossible, in turn making them useless for the purpose of war. This was unacceptable in gem society-- at least, at this point in time, Nephrite added silently to herself-- and therefore these gems must be shattered.

But looking at this zircon, who was labeled as such when he was taken in, she didn’t see anything wrong with him. Well, it was strange this specific gem had to be referred to as “he” and he was… clearly built differently than most other gems, but she didn’t consider him an off-color as two of her elite corps soldiers explained to her over the radio.

“He was found roaming an abandoned zircon Kindergarten by Homeworld,” one amethyst began to list off. “Apparently all were shattered by them, but this one managed to make it. He may still have connection with Homeworld--”

“I don’t have any connection with--” The zircon was cut off with a sharp cuff to the head by the amethyst as she continued.

“There was nothing on him suggesting as such, but the location of this Kindergarten was too far outside of our territory to be ours. The elite ordered us to bring him to you for shattering.”

The zircon pulled against his captors. “Let me go!” he demanded.

Nephrite frowned at the angry gem, wondering what could be done with him. She was concerned he could very well be a ploy for Homeworld, but didn’t understand what made him a threat to her city. Compared to other zircons, he was a bit more lean and taller than what his gem is supposed to look like. And his strength was more than she expected from a supposed off-color. It was like he was meant to be an entirely different gem, like a quartz soldier or a beryl warrior.

She couldn’t help but see some potential in him.

“Would you like to do the honors, ma’am?”

Nephrite examined the zircon silently with her hard gaze, his own slowly becoming fearful the longer her eyes bore into him. Finally she ordered, “Poof him.”

The amethysts were taken aback by her decision. “Wait, what? Just a poofing?”

Even the zircon was shocked. “What are you going to do to me?”

Nephrite’s expression was unchanging from its default sternness. “I have a position for you,” she told him. “A guard for the elite. Of course, you will have to be put on trial according to customs, but I have my ways of keeping you from being shattered.” She didn’t give him enough time to even recover as she summoned her weapon-- a katar gauntlet-- from her gem settled in her palm and jabbed it into his stomach. She watched as he stiffened with a grunt and his physical form dissipated, his gem falling with a dull clatter to the ground.

He’d thank her later.

***

Nephrite smiled at the memory, remembering how his training went after his trial deemed him fit to stay in the city. He was rather stubborn at first to handle; Nephrite had to poof him several times a week whenever he became difficult. Zircon soon adjusted himself to his training and his progression sped up phenomenally. He knew how to properly harness and use his own weapon, which turned out to be a sai, and all procedures to make sure an elite was well protected when they were down. He was the best soldier Nephrite has ever trained.

He was presented with his first elite-- one in training, to be specific-- about six months ago, an aquamarine around a similar skill level as he was. She was more stubborn and brash than he was, which Nephrite thought was a perfect start for Zircon; she would be lying if she said she did this out of revenge. Their relationship, as expected, was rocky and tumultuous. Arguing, fighting, snide remarks and unwillingness to cooperate when the other was involved. Although over the months they’ve gotten a bit better, Nephrite decided to send them on a week-long mission to the abandoned island she often used as a lookout for the elite corps to test their team-building skills by assisting the patrol in border watching, nothing too serious as this was just a test. It’s been four days and she only hoped they didn’t shatter each other by now, though she wouldn’t be surprised if they did.

Her radio suddenly began beeping on the corner of her desk and she groaned. If this is another border update, I swear… She hit the speaker button and responded, “Chief Nephrite here.”

“There’s a hole drilled into the ground underneath the docks,” reported the topaz on the other end, “but there’s no other trace of anyone getting in.”

Nephrite frowned, though she was partially relieved to have something to do. “I’m amping up the security within the city. You track down where the hole leads to and go from there.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Click.

______________

“Of all the places we could’ve gotten in through, did it have to be the sewer?” Zircon crinkled his nose at the stench he was forced to endure for the last five minutes.

“I know.” Aquamarine coughed several times and inhaled deeply once they scurried out of the sewers and dove into a nearby alleyway, “but we’d attract less attention this way. No one could hear us.”

“Point,” Zircon huffed soon after catching his breath. “Okay, how are we getting out from here?”

“I thought you were team captain,” she teased.

“You’d counter me if I even tried,” he pointed. “Now where do you think we should go?”

Aqua was unfazed and smirked. “Well, it wouldn’t hurt to travel by roof.”

“By roof?”

Aqua jabbed a thumb in the direction of the roof of one of the buildings they were beside. “If we just stick to the roofs, we’ll get to the Elite Headquarters in no time.”

“You think we won’t get caught?”

“I am an elite,” Aqua reasoned with a wink. “I know my way around.”

Zircon shrugged. “I can’t argue with that.”

Aqua’s smirk grew wider. “Awesome.”

They climbed the old pipe-- slow, but steady-- and crouched low once they got on the roof. Zircon felt himself matching Aqua’s movements with ease, their shared form moving with more swiftness than their unsure pattern of motions before. He couldn’t help but feel the struggle he exhibited through this pattern since he and Aqua fused dissipating as they crawled along the long roof. Strangely enough, he registered her contribution in controlling a more complex physical form as being less of a burden the more he moved with her than against her.

Strange…

Aqua then experienced a sudden wave of uneasiness. She frowned, her gaze shifting to the side. “Strange?”

Zircon blinked a few times in surprise, briefly amazed that Aqua knew what was going on through his mind, but then he rolled his eyes at himself. Of course she’d pick up his thoughts; they were their thoughts. “Err… It’s fine.”

Aqua snickered a bit. “You know that response only works on a select few people, not including me,” she teased.

Zircon cleared his throat, feeling a warmth spread across the bridge of his nose. “Erm… I think it’s safe to assume that you feel it, too… right?”

She let out a choked sound that could’ve been a soft gasp. She didn’t know why she was so surprised when they were sharing one form. “... Lucky assumption,” she murmured, unusually embarrassed to give a simple “yes”.

“Heh…” He fell quiet, not sure how to continue.

“You think it’s strange?” Worry overcame her… then the both of them.

“N-no! It’s fine. I just… I didn’t expect to feel so… comfortable as a fusion.”

“Me neither…”

Silence swallowed the air around them for a few beats, then Aqua piped up in a quiet voice, “You saved me…”

Zircon paused, the both of them at the edge of the roof. “Yeah?”

“That’s kinda how it happened, right?” she reminded him. “You saved me from being crushed.”

Zircon almost forgot about that. He didn’t think of it before through the shock of fusing, but realizing it now, he’s bewildered at how easily he pushed it aside. How naturally he took action to throw himself in front of her when he saw the ledge collapsing. “Yeah… I guess something came over me,” he replied.

A genuine smile came upon Aqua’s face, stomach tying itself in knots. “Thank you,” she told him.

She sensed that stomach-knotting sensation being reciprocated by Zircon, who hesitated for a moment before saying, “You’re… you’re welcome…”

Krrrrrr…

Their form stiffened at the sound of the old boards beneath them. Before they could react, however, they were sent plummeting through the roof and through a rickety table. Nothing about their landing was gracious.

Crap!

They scrambled to their knees, scanning the room they landed in. Luckily, it was an abandoned building and no one seemed to have been wandering inside and no other sound filled the room besides their heavy panting. As soon as they caught their breath, they got to their feet.

“Heh…” That was a close one,” Zircon sighed.

“Yeah,” Aqua agreed. “I’m amazed--”

Before he could finish, a pink laser beam blasted through the wall to their right, blazing just past their face to the opposite end of the room. They whipped around and saw an elite corps soldier already shouting orders to her group to grab them. The burly team rushed at them, each armed with a unique weapon save for the ones at the front, who wielded metal cord gauntlets and shot the cords in their direction.

Instinct took over and their form leapt out of the way, ducking in a corner at first and then towards the door when the second wave of metal cords flew towards them.

“You were gonna say you’re amazed no one heard us, right?” Zircon sneered.

“Jinxing is a part of life!” Aqua insisted. “Everyone does it!”

They skidded out of the door and bolted down the street, their feet just barely touching the ground. Looking above them, they saw there were already hovercrafts on the scene, flying after them as well, flinging metal discs that grazed their arms and legs.

“After that gem!” the head soldier ordered.

More cords were sent their way as well as laser beams and other various ammo. They ducked underneath parked mini ships and dove through crowds of gems in passing, but they couldn’t lose any of the elite behind them. Glancing back, they saw that a few managed to close in on them and attack, throwing spears, the amount doubling in mid attack. They faced ahead of them and saw there was a large ship passing through, moving slow down the street with no sign of speeding up. Feeling the presence of the spears advancing toward the back of their neck, their fusion leapt upward in one great bound, the spears just missing their ankle and piercing into the side of the ship. To both Aqua and Zircon’s surprise, they manipulated the air around them as they shot into the air, unconsciously creating a platform below their feet.

“Woah!” Aqua exclaimed.

They quickly realized how unsteady the platform was as they zoomed through the air, almost falling off a few times after some misplaced steps on the board, but they soon found balance and soared over the city smoothly.

“We got a hoverboard!” Aqua continued. “Look at this!” She laughed ecstatically as she picked up speed.

Zircon just stared blankly ahead of him as they cut fast corners around the tall buildings to lose the elites, unable to fathom what just occurred. “A hoverboard…? We just made a hoverboard out of thin air… literally...”

“I know, right? They can’t even catch us now!” she cackled. She turned to taunt the team of elites behind them, but saw a boulder-sized rock barreling straight for them. “Duck!”

They dodged the rock and looked ahead to focus on their path, but was met with a street lamp. They were moving so fast it was impossible for them to stop themselves from crashing face first into the post, their hoverboard released into the air. They, along with the lamp, flew another couple of yards before skidding down into another alley and crashing into a garbage bin filled with old, rusted metal and other mechanical parts rendered useless.

Underneath the pile of rejected machinery, another white glow emerged before gradually dimming down. Next to come from this pile were Aqua and Zircon.

“Ugh… We need to learn to drive first,” murmured Aqua.

Zircon shook his head, head pounding from the impact. “Ditto.” He lifted a hand to his head and turned to face Aqua… Wait… Aqua? He was able to see her physical form, sitting up and rubbing her shoulder. His eyes widened as he stared at himself, looking over his arms and legs and body. “Aqua, we’re--”

“Unfused?!” Aqua picked up on the realization as quickly as he did her eyes glittering as she turned to him.

“Finally!”

“Yes!”

The two threw their arms around each other in relief, laughing with glee at the feeling of being in their own bodies again. However, their celebration was short-lived at the sound of hovercrafts overhead and the thumping of heavy footsteps just around the corner. It was obvious escape was not a choice anymore.

The elite corps leader had her team block the entryway to the alley and approached the two gems. She opened her mouth wide to boom out another order when she took another look at the culprits.

“Aquamarine?” With a disbelieving glance at Zircon, she let out a comical sputter and pointed at him “You fused?! And with him of all people?!”

Zircon narrowed his eyes at her. Shoddy brick…

Aqua got to her feet and shot a cross look at the leader. “I did,” she confirmed with a mocking, spiteful grin. “Nice to see your deductive skills are working just fine, Onyx.”

Onyx visibly fumed. “You were sent to do important survey work and you’re fraternizing with your guard,” she growled. Her dark gray cheeks burned white, unable to comprehend the idea of what she witnessed. “I’d expect this from you, but you are an elite gem! You should know better than to sink this low.”

“As if you didn’t consider me as scum already.” Aqua rolled her eyes.

“Why you--?!” Onyx clenched her fists in frustration before loosening them and huffing. She opted to turn her attention to Zircon. “And you! Disgusting excuse for a guard! I knew you weren’t going to take your job seriously from the get-go. What makes you think you would get away with this?!”

Zircon flared up and got to his feet as well. “It wasn’t my intention--”

Onyx jabbed him in his chest, eyes glaring down at him. “And why should I take your word for it?” she challenged him.

Before Zircon could make a move, Aqua moved closer to his side almost protectively. “Because I can vouch for him,” she spat. “You know, as an ‘elite gem’.” She mocked the corps leader’s airy tone as she brought up the term.

Onyx growled at that, but ignored and summoned her short range spear eyeing Zircon. “Enough of this!” she barked. “What you did was inexcusable! I’m sure Nephrite will be disgusted enough to approve of my shattering you!” With that, she grabbed Zircon by the arm and prepared to pierce through his gem.

“No!”

Zircon felt a weight rush into his side and twisted his eyes shut. When he opened them, however, he saw that he was now taller than Onyx. Looking down, he saw his skin was pale blue once again. Their skin.

Aqua…?

Their fusion glared down at Onyx in a calm fury, now wielding a ring sword of ice in the hand Onyx didn’t have a hold of. They slammed the blade into Onyx’s shield, causing her to release her grip and double backwards. They towered over her with the ring sword held in front of them and threatened, “If you kill him, you kill me, too.”

Zircon could believe the intense rage radiating throughout his being now. He’s never known Aqua to be this angry, nonetheless able to feel it. Aqua… What are you doing?

An rough and almost lighthearted response came to him. You save me, I save you.

The light blue blush that came across their fusion’s face went unnoticed by Onyx and her team, lost to the fire in their dark blue eyes. Onyx shuddered, trying to gather her words.

“Er… H-hey, let’s not be too hasty,” she stammered. “I can’t shatter an aquamarine… You know that’s mutiny on my part, right?”

“Try me,” was the fusion’s cold reply.

Onyx chuckled nervously. “And that’s totally fine! Completely fine! Fine, fine, fine!” She stuttered over her words, eyes shifting from side to side. “Uhm… hey, you know what? I-I’ll let you go, is that what you want? Huh? What do you want?” Beads of sweat trickled down her temple.

The fusion took a few slow steps forward, leaned in so they were at eye level with Onyx, and demanded in a menacing tone, “Take me to Nephrite.”

__________________

Nephrite has been getting repetitive calls of a disturbance downtown for ten minutes and she’s been trying to contact her corps officers to get on the scene, but none answered their radio. Her officers never failed to answer their chief at any time, so hearing so much ado about a commotion in such a short amount of time and what seemed to be nothing done to remedy it frustrated her to no end. She slammed a hand on the table and pushed herself out of her chair to head for the door’s entrance panel, deciding to take it upon herself to settle things, when the door slid open on its own.

Behind it stood Onyx and her elite officers. Heading them was a rather tall gem in a ragged dress and unruly hair.

Nephrite gazed at the gem in awe and disbelief, whereas the gem gave her a very nervous grin. Then her look of amazement turned into one of exhaustion and slight annoyance. “Of course.” She ushered the new gem in and ordered her elites to stay outside. Walking away and facing the window behind her, the only thing she had to say was, “You had one job…”

The gem began hastily giving out explanations that conflicted with each other. “We were doing what we were supposed to do-- there was a rock-- but we didn’t know how to unfuse-- couldn’t let anyone see us-- the dumb clod out there wouldn’t--”

“At once, please.” Nephrite felt more and more fatigued by the second.

The fusion stopped in their tracks and paused for a few beats, opening their mouth and hesitating for another moment, then began to say. “... Zircon saved Aqua from being shattered by the crumbling rocks on the lookout island and they became… me.” They stopped for a moment, registering their own words before continuing. “I tried to sneak through the city so I wouldn’t get caught for who I am. I ended up getting caught anyways and along the way I became Zircon and Aqua. Onyx was the one to suggest shattering Zircon for creating me, but Aqua fused with him to protect him and so the both of them could get to you in one piece.”

Nephrite tilted her chin up in acknowledgement. “I see…”

The fusion let out a heavy sigh. “... Look, I know I’m not supposed to exist. I know this could’ve gotten Zircon and Aqua in a whole mess of trouble… but now that I’m here and you know who I am… could you please give them another chance? This was never their intention. I was just… an accident.” They fell silent and looked away, unsure of how else to put it.

Despite the confession, the corner of Nephrite’s mouth quirked upward into a very faint, very brief smile. She walked over to the fusion and rested a hand on their shoulder, silent for a while before telling them, “You aren’t an accident, Chalcedony Quartz.”

The fusion’s eyes widened at the name. Chalcedony… that’s what we… I am.

“If anything you’re a work of heart,” Nephrite continued. “It’s normal to feel this way, but you are more a miracle than an accident.”

Chalcedony stared at her for a moment, then they cracked a small smile. “Going soft on us, are we?” they asked.

Nephrite stiffened, her nose crinkling in distaste. “Wh--?!” Her brows furrowed. “Why don’t you get back to your post?!”

“Like this?”

“At least you’re a form of cooperation,” she huffed. She opened up a panel on her desk, typing up a new file. “Now I’ve gotta have you legalized as well,” she muttered under her breath.

Chalcedony’s eyes lit up. “You’re covering me?”

“Don’t get too excited. It’s not instant,” Nephrite warned them. “And it was inevitable anyways if I’m going to have you two working together.”

“Yes! Thank you! This is awesome!”