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The mothership charged another shot, attempting to aim around the large, translucent pink shield blocking its path to the surface of the planet. Steven was struggling to maintain such a large shield, especially against such destructive blasts. Sweat ran down his face, his eyes closed, teeth grinding in concentration. His outstretched arms shook with the strain of holding off the blasts, his gem glowing much too brightly. But, despite the strain Steven was faster. He adjusted his own flight and kept his defense centered in front of the ship's canons flawlessly, scattering a clump of smaller drone ships as the mountainous spectre swiveled into their formation. Lars quickly swooped in, taking the opportunity and leaving the current swarm of drones to Connie, Sadie and Amethyst and the single pilot fighters he had provided them- an added docking bay a recent addition to his own ship he was immensely glad for.
Formation divided, the group of drones was easily picked off by Lars's ship as they buzzed frantically, disordered swoops portraying the chaos in their own ranks. Pearl let out a whoop from the left side artillery cabin as the last ship burst with the heat of its own damaged engine. However, from the plume of smoke shot a final ship, painted with the stripes of a unit captain, the exploded decoy ship providing it enough cover to get much too close to Lars's ship without their notice. Garnet fired 2 shots after the ship, but it was already too far gone, shooting towards the completely undefended man behind them.
'Steven!' lars shouted, watching the ship rocket towards the gem. 'Reverse course!'
They spun around and pursued the ship, but it had already fired. Steven managed to pull his left arm away from the shield, holding it out to the side in the direction of the encroaching ship, and erected a bubble just in time. He grunted with the effort. The blast hit the bubble and scattered harmlessly. A moment later lars swooped in and took out the fighter. Relief washed through them until suddenly Steven flinched, grunting with pain, as his bubble more *broke* than popped, a large crack appearing down the side of his shield. His left hand reflexively gripped his gem, like covering a wound, blocking some of the light and bunching his shirt as he curled up slightly, hunching over, obscuring his face. His shield started deteriorating, phasing like it had after he had been hit with the rejuvenator. Still with his head down and his shoulders slumped inwards, he purposefully raised his hand from his gem and brought it up to match his other. Panting heavily, he looked up at the shield and at the ship behind it. There was a large black crack running the length of the side of his face, going over his eye, the iris now a glowing pink color. His freed shirt flapped in the wind, revealing a matching crack running down his gem. Lars and his crew were paralyzed.
'Oh no, Steven will overuse his gem and it will crack!' Padparadscha helpfully stated. This shook them out of their stupor, rushing to blast some incoming ships. They were distracted though, keeping their eyes on Steven. Thankfully they had just about taken out all the fighters, only a few stragglers remained. Another large blast rung across the shield. Steven shook, bracing against the impact. The shield's crack grew audibly. Steven yelled in frustration. He hunched over again, seeming to draw energy into his gem. His arms bent, no longer focusing on maintaining the shield, which promptly dissipated, the remaining energy absorbed back into the pink diamond gem. Even the flickering pink glow emitted by the gem seemed to be sucked back into its source. Steven curled into himself, as if he too were being drawn in by the gem. Everything was still and silent for a moment, muted by the sudden of loss of energy in the air. Then, all at once Steven shouted, unfurling violently, releasing all his power, pink energy shooting out from him in a sphere with him as the center. The energy shorted all enemy ships it came in contact with, but somehow had no effect on their allies. The energy sphere crashed into the mothership, violently pushing it up and away, damaging its blasters before reaching its radius and dissipating. The mother ship righted itself, pointing its smoking nose back towards Steven. Lars and the allied fighters pulled up behind him, leveling their canons at the large ship now devoid of allies of its own. Steven kept his steely gaze lock on its bow, posture hunched but eyes fiery. The ship flew off. Steven remained floating, slouched in the air for a moment, and suddenly he was falling, no longer able to keep himself afloat. Lars jumped into action, commanding his ship to veer under the falling gem, opening the hatch for Steven to drop through. Steven struggled to catch himself in the air, but only managed to slightly slow his fall before landing with a thump against the hard metal floor. He groaned, coughing weakly.
'Steven!' Lars shouted, rushing to him. He grabbed his shoulders, rolling him to his back. Steven's eyes fluttered, half open, crack still prominent down the side of his face. He groaned again, rolling his head hazily. His eyes drooped. Pearl and Garnet appeared instantly, as if from the air itself.
Pearl frantically patted his cheek 'Steven? Steven, look at me!' She said, tears beginning to pool in the eyes. He groggily rolled his head to her side, eyes opening marginally.
'That's it Steven, just focus on the sound of my voice. I need you to stay awake for me, 'kay?' She refocused, pulling up his shirt to reveal his damaged gem. A large, dark crack ran right down through the middle, with smaller fracture radiating out from it. She grew even more frantic, tears loosing themselves.
'We need to get him to the warp pad, now! We need to get him to - '
'No. We can fly there faster. Besides we cant risk warping him like this' garnet cut in.
'But they don't know how to get there!' Pearl whined, hysterical.
'So get over there and tell them!' Garnet snapped in a rare moment of lost composure. Pearl, wide-eyed, rushed away.
Steven's expression scrunched, shouting out in pain, back arching as a new small crack snapped across his gem. 'He's fracturing!' Garnet shouted. Steven flailed, grabbing for his gem. Garnet seized his wrists, keeping him from hurting himself. His head rolled to the side, form rattling with weak coughs. Suddenly she thrust his arms towards Lars.
'Hold him.'
'Uh- Sure?' Lars took his limp hands into his own.
Steven had calmed again by this point, the initial jolt of pain from the new crack had passed. He returned to his state of hazy moaning and occasional grimacing. Lars held Steven's arms down, on either side of his head, as he watched Garnet charge a strange blue energy in one of her hands. She quickly pressed it down against Steven's gem. Steven's eyes shot open. He shrieked, thrashing, pink iris glowing wildly. Lars shot down, thrusting his elbows down against Steven's shoulders, bring him uncomfortably close to Steven's face. He closed his eyes against his friends agonized screams. Unfortunately for him Steven's strength barely even noticed Lars's body weight, struggling to sit up under Garnets firm press against him, forming a small, unyielding ring of ice around the outside of the boy's gem. Unable to rise against the fusion's strength, Steven settled for trying to pry her hand off his gem, Lars's arms flopping helplessly around with the thrashing gem, still gripping his wrists.
'I said hold him down!' Garnet said through clenched teeth.
'I'm trying! He's stronger than he looks...'
Steven managed to pry Garnet off. The moment the connection broke, two more cracks audibly snapped across his gem, one right after another. Steven jerked back, eyes wide, smacking the back of his head against the hard metal floor in the jolt of fresh agony. He writhed aimlessly. In one fluid motion Garnet summoned her gauntlets, popped out bismuth's new additions and snatched them from the air. She pressed a button on each with her thumbs and the bottom bar folded out, opening the square grip hole. She fluidly grabbed Steven's arms and slammed the grip down around his wrists, smashing the two bottom spokes through the floor. She released the button, and the bottom bar closed again, fully securing Steven to the ground. She reconnected with Steven's gem, and he thrashed again, shackles denting the floor but holding. Lars repositioned, holding Stevens shoulders down as much as he can, which wasn't much.
Steven, tears growing in the corner of his remaining brown eye, flitted between shrieking, yelling, sputtering, and coughing, writhing below him. 'Cant this thing go any faster?' Lars shouted, tears cascading down his face.
'Not this close to the surface' some one responded.
'Then go higher!'
'Steven wouldn't survive the atmospheric turbulence ' Pearl responded defeatedly.
By the time they arrived, Steven was all but unresponsive, only twitching slightly when new cracks appear.
'We're here' Pearl said frazzled, rushing out of the pilot's chair to Steven's side. She grabbed one of his hands in hers, cradling it close to her chest, looking down at Steven's face, barely avoiding breaking down. His face was a permanent sheet of pain, despite the relaxed muscles of the barely conscious boy.
'We cant risk moving him now.' Garnet. She shot up, looking around quickly, and settled for ripping a corner of paneling off one of the consoles.
'Hey!' Lars said, but she was already gone, rushing towards the fountain with her make-shift bucket.
It felt like hours had passed, the stillness of the boy at the center of their attention doing nothing to speed the passage of time, before Garnet returned, panting, bucket of pale pink liquid in hand. She wasted no time in rushing over to Steven and pouring the healing water on to the boy's broken gem, held together only by the corporeal nature of his human flesh. The diamond glowed with pink light as it absorbed the liquid, almost buzzing with the sudden rush of energy. It floated into the air, pulling the unconscious boy's skin taut, and slowly the cracks began to disappear, the gem seamlessly mending itself as the light intensified. All at once the gem flashed with a blinding glow, forcing all present to flinch away and guard their eyes from the light. When they turned back, all was still, gem resting benignly in Steven's still torso, the crack on his face seamlessly sealing itself- and then it was gone, leaving only pristine skin behind. Pearl moved forward, leaning over the gem and placing a hand over his unmoving chest.
'Steven...?' She called after a moment, voice quavering with warring fear and hope.
His eyes shot open, body sputtering with sudden breath. Pearl had to turn her face again, shielding herself from the intensity of the boy's eyes set in an expressionless face-
Eyes burning with a violent, pink light.