"Really?" Jasper stops when they're only a couple feet apart. "So this is what, a ploy to get me thrown in Zero? You know they can only keep me there for a week."
Right. Jasper totally believes that. But Rose is asking for it - literally.
"Pity this won't be permanent." She growls the words out, stepping forward to slam her palm against the other Quartz's gem, fingers digging in around it. She doesn't have the strength she did, but she has enough for this.
The urge to fight it is - terrible, almost sickeningly so. She has to
clench her fists at her sides, fight down the urge to summon her shield;
she'd thought Jasper would improvise a weapon, not...
This.
The world vanishes, her body turns into pale smoke, and the Gem drawn free
is unmistakably not the flat shape of a Rose Quartz.
She looks down at the gem in her hand, a brief flash of satisfaction quickly fading as a chill runs through her form, a curious kind of numbness where she can't quite seem to parse what she's looking at.
The Gem only take a few minutes to rise from Jasper's hand and reform its
body. Rose has no control over how - it's Pink, from the bouffant
bob down to the little floaty shoe pompoms.
"...I couldn't have just told you this," she says, quietly.
Jasper takes a step back, then two. "...stop it," voice hoarse and shaking. "That's not funny. Change back, now!" She doesn't know how she's doing it, but of course it has to be a trick. She has to be working with someone to do this. Because otherwise-
-she can't even begin to untangle what otherwise would mean.
"I won't. Rose Quartz was who I became, when the other Diamonds wouldn't
let me stop the colonisation, when they wouldn't listen to me. This is
who I really was, Jasper."
"No!" Her voice is raw with more than just her usual anger, her fists clenched and eyes wide. "You- Pink is gone! Shattered! We mourned her - I still-"
She's still mourning. The tears are welling now, her defenses in complete shambles. She doesn't notice.
A Diamond is a funny thing to her court. Creator, mother, general. Jasper came out of the ground loving her, would have fallen into her arms if they were offered in any other context than this.
She steps away. "You made me," she whispers. Her brain is whirling, but she's never been dumb, even if she prefers to solve things with her fists. She can feel the truth of this in her core. The implications are falling into place now. What this means for her, for her life, for everything she believed in.
She turns away, holding her head in her hands, not able to look any longer.
"You made us." And they hadn't had her taken from them. She'd left them. She'd brought them to life never planning to stay. Jasper looks at her sideways, through shaking fingers, the tears coming fast and thick now.
"You made us to fight and shatter your own troops. And- and to be shattered by them? You made us knowing we could only fail?" Even if they defeated the Crystal Gems, it would have been going against their Diamond's true wishes.
The anger's coming back now, but brittle and heartbroken. "Is that why the Beta Kindergarten was such a mess? You wanted the Crystal Gems to win? Did I-" she lets out something between a sob and a choked, hollow laugh. "Did I disappoint you by being so effective?"
She wasn't wanted. Pink never wanted her. She was nothing, a pawn in a big hoax. Nothing but a joke.
"Homeworld didn't create me so I could fail!" She'd never have believed the vitriol in those words could be directed at a Diamond - her own Diamond. But her hatred at Rose and at herself isn't gone because of this. It just got a lot more complicated. "I fought for you, I loved you-!"
Pink doesn't get to blame this on anyone else. Jasper can't hold back on another choked sob.
Jasper jerks away from the hand, even though it doesn't reach her. Does she hate her own Diamond? She isn't sure. But she never thought anything could hurt her this much.
"Jasper, I've spent millennia dealing with the consequences of the
corrupting light. What else could I have done to make the Diamonds leave
Earth alone?"
"And I spent my life thinking I was fighting for you, that I was yours, when you'd abandoned me before I was even out of the ground." Before the injectors had even come down, because clearly they were just bodies to cover up what was really going on.
"Your promises and excuses are just as hollow now as they were coming from Rose."
She backs away again. How can she act like this was anything but her own fault? Sharing the Barge with Rose alone was bad enough.
"Of course I cared!" she insists, to Jasper's turned back. "I mourned
every shattering, every loss. But I was fighting for the life of a whole
planet."
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"It isn't. Ford knows this is happening. He's not going to look for you to be punished."
Rose meets her gaze unflinchingly.
"If I just told you this, you wouldn't believe it. I have to show you."
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"Pity this won't be permanent." She growls the words out, stepping forward to slam her palm against the other Quartz's gem, fingers digging in around it. She doesn't have the strength she did, but she has enough for this.
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The urge to fight it is - terrible, almost sickeningly so. She has to clench her fists at her sides, fight down the urge to summon her shield; she'd thought Jasper would improvise a weapon, not...
This.
The world vanishes, her body turns into pale smoke, and the Gem drawn free is unmistakably not the flat shape of a Rose Quartz.
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She looks down at the gem in her hand, a brief flash of satisfaction quickly fading as a chill runs through her form, a curious kind of numbness where she can't quite seem to parse what she's looking at.
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The Gem only take a few minutes to rise from Jasper's hand and reform its body. Rose has no control over how - it's Pink, from the bouffant bob down to the little floaty shoe pompoms.
"...I couldn't have just told you this," she says, quietly.
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-she can't even begin to untangle what otherwise would mean.
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She shakes her head minutely.
"I won't. Rose Quartz was who I became, when the other Diamonds wouldn't let me stop the colonisation, when they wouldn't listen to me. This is who I really was, Jasper."
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She's still mourning. The tears are welling now, her defenses in complete shambles. She doesn't notice.
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She takes a step closer.
"...I'm so sorry, Jasper. I didn't have a choice."
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She steps away. "You made me," she whispers. Her brain is whirling, but she's never been dumb, even if she prefers to solve things with her fists. She can feel the truth of this in her core. The implications are falling into place now. What this means for her, for her life, for everything she believed in.
She turns away, holding her head in her hands, not able to look any longer.
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"Yes. I did. I thought the threat of the Crystal Gems would have been enough to convince them to leave the Earth alone."
And yet she'd continued to raise armies, regardless.
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"You made us to fight and shatter your own troops. And- and to be shattered by them? You made us knowing we could only fail?" Even if they defeated the Crystal Gems, it would have been going against their Diamond's true wishes.
The anger's coming back now, but brittle and heartbroken. "Is that why the Beta Kindergarten was such a mess? You wanted the Crystal Gems to win? Did I-" she lets out something between a sob and a choked, hollow laugh. "Did I disappoint you by being so effective?"
She wasn't wanted. Pink never wanted her. She was nothing, a pawn in a big hoax. Nothing but a joke.
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"No. Never. Not even for a moment. Jasper, you - you're incredible. But what Homeworld taught you isn't right."
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Pink doesn't get to blame this on anyone else. Jasper can't hold back on another choked sob.
"And I thought Rose was cruel!"
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She reaches out as if to touch her shoulder, then decides that's a bad idea and withdraws.
"I didn't have a choice, Jasper."
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"You had more of a choice than I did."
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She shakes her head.
"That's not true. You could have joined the Crystal Gems, too. I could have protected you."
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Look how many gems were saved from that.
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She's tearing up now, of course.
"Jasper, I've spent millennia dealing with the consequences of the corrupting light. What else could I have done to make the Diamonds leave Earth alone?"
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"Your promises and excuses are just as hollow now as they were coming from Rose."
She backs away again. How can she act like this was anything but her own fault? Sharing the Barge with Rose alone was bad enough.
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"I'm not making excuses. I'm asking you, Jasper - would anything else have made the Diamonds leave Earth?"
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She doesn't care. She doesn't care about the Earth, or the other Diamonds, or anything but her, and Pink, and her world crashing down around her.
She shakes her head. "But of course you don't care. I knew that much about Rose." She turns away now. She can't keep listening to this.
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"Of course I cared!" she insists, to Jasper's turned back. "I mourned every shattering, every loss. But I was fighting for the life of a whole planet."
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