Chapter Text
The pearl, being sensible, does exactly what she’s supposed to do. She takes form in Pink Diamond’s chambers and eagerly introduces herself to her Diamond. When a gem is made, she knows precisely what for, and how to perform her purpose. The placement of her gem as suspended within her physical form reflects her temperament, as does the light of the Diamond she’s made from. Pearls are made in White Diamond’s perfect image, and this pearl, intended for Pink Diamond, has White Diamond’s perfect gem placement to boot. She’s been given to Pink Diamond, and her purpose is to serve Pink Diamond; to make Pink Diamond happy.
She runs gem-first into the unsolvable problem of her own existence as a result. Pink Diamond wants nothing to do with the pearl from the moment she first takes form, and Pink Diamond is never happy. There’s no need for a gem without a use, and no use for an unwanted pearl. If this doesn’t change, there’s no reason for her to exist. No reason for her to have been made in the first place. From the outset, her creation doesn’t make any sense, and yet White Diamond’s judgment is perfect, and so it must. The pearl, therefore, tries to make sense of it.
The pearl does everything right, and every thing she does is wrong. She’s made to know a pearl’s sweet song and delicate dance and how to apply them. Her performance is designed to entertain any gem a pearl may be given to. When Pink Diamond’s lost to one of her brooding spells, turned away from pearl and balcony both and twisted in on herself, the pearl watches in restless stasis.
She thinks, perhaps a song. The silence shatters with her first melodious croon. Pink Diamond bolts upright as though struck by a tuning fork, and the pearl loses her perfect composure for a moment, voice falling to pieces in the air around them. Pink Diamond urges the pearl be quiet, and the pearl obeys. It doesn’t happen again.
If singing won’t do, perhaps a dance; but at the pearl’s first attempt, Pink Diamond waves her down from toe-tip with a frantic flail, and the pearl settles back into nothing. Unmoving, she tries praising Pink Diamond, a short-lived aggrandizement of her brilliance, her luster, and impeccable radiance. Pink Diamond tells her to stop. The pearl stops. All she’s done, it seems, is stop.
Sometimes Pink Diamond brings her along for extraction, and sometimes the pearl remains in Pink Diamond’s room. She stands where Pink Diamond has left her, beaming at the blank wall, feet pressed parallel. Pink Diamond’s curtain stirs here and again, and light spills through the space. It’s no different from when Pink Diamond is present, but somehow the room feels brighter when empty. Enchanted by the shape of starlight traveling the floor, the pearl looks out the window, once, and sees the distant geometry of White Diamond’s head. She returns to smiling at Pink Diamond’s closed door.
When it opens, the pearl rushes to greet her Diamond with forearms crossed. Pink Diamond looks at her. It’s the first time the pearl has made eye contact since her introduction, as they’re not often face-to-face. Pink Diamond’s are pink, diamond-like pupils punched through the surface, wide and darting around the pearl. The pearl brightens her expression and straightens her back. Pink Diamond’s scowl lands like a blow. She looks away. The pearl’s smile falters.
Pink Diamond grasps the pearl by the wrists, immovably delicate, and tugs her hands apart. “...stop doing that.” She’s sort of smiling as she releases her grip on the pearl, but it doesn’t reach her eyes, still averted. It’s not really directed at the pearl, she doesn’t think, but it’s the first scrap of success the pearl has seen in her lifetime of fruitless self-improvement.
The pearl hurries to comply. Stop is a command she’s received more than any other, and the pearl adds Diamond salute to the growing list of behaviors to conceal in Pink Diamond‘s presence. She folds her hands together instead. “Did you have a nice extraction, my Diamond?” Pink Diamond looks as though she’s been choked. She doesn’t answer.
Pink Diamond doesn’t look at her again for some time, and the pearl can’t help but turn that expression over in the privacy of her mind. It makes no sense. The pearl is behaving exactly as she should, and yet Pink Diamond is a Diamond, so her judgment is foolproof by design. The pearl’s inadequacy is not for lack of effort or purpose. She has no other way to be, after all. Perhaps the problem is not her information, but its execution. Though all gems are made knowing what they’re for, the pearl is already running up against the limits of her understanding. Maybe she’s missing something. She‘ll have to think of another approach.
Pink Diamond continues to brood.
At the extraction chamber, the pearl comes in contact with the other Diamonds’ pearls. While Blue Diamond and Yellow Diamond converse over Pink Diamond’s bowed head, emerging from the water, their three pearls wait in line along the deck downstairs. The other two pearls, like Pink Diamond, won’t look at the pearl. They wait. The pearl wonders if their Diamonds take to song and dance, or gestures of devotion, but they don’t speak, so neither does she. One day the Diamonds are deep in conversation on the opposite end of their chamber, and she finally meets them. The other Diamonds’ pearls break posture and peer at her.
“So you’re still here,” is the first thing Yellow Diamond’s pearl whispers to her, and the pearl just nods, staring at them both.
“How are you feeling?” Blue Diamond’s pearl asks.
This, the pearl knows the answer to. “My feelings are irrelevant,” she says.
This pleases Yellow Diamond’s pearl. “She’s sensible,” she says to Blue Diamond’s. “That’s promising.”
Blue Diamond’s pearl just smiles. The pearl can’t see her eyes beyond the fringe of her hair. She becomes aware of her own dullness in the face of her two perfectly customized peers.
“You can call me Blue,” says Blue Diamond’s pearl. “She’s Yellow.”
“Like the Diamonds?” The pearl says before her sense has caught up with her voice, and then pinches her mouth shut. Yellow recoils in disgust at the audacious comparison, and the pearl knows she has just ruined her good first impression.
Blue only nods. “I suppose.”
They don’t call her anything. The pearl has enough sense to imagine the next logical step, but doesn’t dare suggest it. She may have been given to Pink Diamond, but she still isn’t Pink Diamond’s pearl.
Extraction ends. They return to Pink Diamond’s chambers.
The next gem she meets is Pink Diamond’s Spinel. The pearl accompanies Pink Diamond to her garden, where Pink Diamond and Spinel may play. The other gem is impertinent and inseparable from Pink Diamond, and the pearl feels something new at the sight of Pink Diamond beaming by the flowers. Spinel’s elastic appendages are coiled about Pink Diamond’s middle and Pink Diamond is shaking with delight. Spinel tells a joke. Pink Diamond laughs. It looks so easy. The pearl despairs.
Like extraction, it’s not every time that Pink Diamond brings her on these visits, and sometimes the pearl is left alone for long enough to watch the starlight reach the curtain’s opposite edge.
The pearl is waiting in her spot by the balcony when Pink Diamond storms in from an excursion, steaming with fury in place of her usual sadness. The pearl isn’t permitted to sing or dance or praise her Diamond’s radiance, so she settles for a place at Pink Diamond’s side, smiling and attentive, trying to communicate cheer without defying any of Pink Diamond’s rules.
Pink Diamond smashes a hole in the wall and leaves. She’s done it once before, though just the once. The pebbles had sealed it in short order that time; the pearl watched. Pink Diamond’s room contains a passel of pebbles, each no larger than the pearl’s gem. Like all gems, pebbles serve the Diamonds, in their own manner. They’re hidden from sight within the walls, and only emerge when required to fulfill Pink Diamond’s requests or patch damage to the architecture. The pearl catches an occasional glimpse of their forms clinging to the undercarriage of some structural extrusion, but has never seen one in full.
The room contains these three types of gems: Diamond, pebble, pearl. Each behaves as though the others aren’t there. The pearl still doesn’t know what to make of it. When they’re alone, if the pebbles aren’t away, she catches little whispers all around her.
Now the pearl watches the dent instead of the curtain’s trail, as it’s something new. It’s full of shadow. The pebbles haven’t got to it yet. They work instantly in Pink Diamond’s presence, but sometimes they slip away when Pink Diamond is gone, and it’s possible they won’t be back until word travels of her reapproach.
The pearl is struck by a thought: she’s watched the pebbles repair. She could do it herself. She’s no good at her own purpose, but maybe she can make up for it by finding another way to lift Pink Diamond’s mood.
The pearl is no pebble, and it’s her first time trying, but after searching about the edges of the panel for a release her narrow fingers find the gaps. Pushing against the wall with her slipper for leverage, the pearl tugs at it, and just as the thing creaks out of place Pink Diamond walks back into the room.
They eye one another. The pearl jumps away from the broken surface, wide-eyed and mouth shut, fearing the worst.
“I forgot to tell you; Blue moved our extraction up,” Pink Diamond says. “Let’s go.”
The pearl follows.
They pass more time in silence in the room. Pink Diamond continues to speak to her in trickles; a line about one of the other Diamonds, something she’d seen in her garden. Mostly she talks about starting a colony. The other Diamonds don’t think she’s ready, but Pink Diamond would like nothing more than to assume her rightful place beside them. The pearl does her best to respond in a pleasing manner. Pink Diamond inevitably dwindles back into silence. When leaving, she takes the pearl along for the most part.
The next time Pink Diamond visits the garden, she leaves the pearl behind at the warp.
“Sorry,” she says. “I won’t be long.”
Privately, the pearl is relieved not to bear witness to Spinel and Pink Diamond’s recreation. She waits where she’s supposed to.
Not many gems pass by the warp, but it’s more than the pearl’s seen yet. She recognizes them all from the knowledge she’s made with. It’s still something else to see in person. Towering guard gems thrice her size lumber by and the sight of sleek water wings glittering at an Aquamarine’s back is beyond compare. A group of Blue Diamond’s Amethyst guards pause before taking the warp to their destination and get cheeky with the pearl instead.
“Hello,” says an Amethyst guard.
The pearl says nothing. She’s not here for them.
“Who do you belong to?” one says.
“Pink Diamond,” says the pearl automatically. She’s never said it aloud before. It feels like a fib. The guards certainly react that way.
“Yeah, right,” one says, gem on the side of her head. She flashes the pearl a crooked smile, which the pearl ignores.
One of the others squints at the pearl, leaning rather too close. The pearl can see her own reflection in the Amethyst’s eye gem, imperfectly placid. “That’s a default, right?”
“It’s the truth,” the pearl insists, turning up her nose at their rudeness.
“Then why aren’t you pink?” asks another. The pearl has no answer for that.
Pink Diamond visits the garden again, but she doesn’t always leave the pearl behind. The pearl hasn’t made up her mind about which option she likes less, not that it particularly matters, but she’s still leaning in favor of Spinel’s unbearable charm.
At least their games always end.
“I guess it’s time to go. Hey, Pearl,” Pink Diamond says, turning around. It’s the first time she’s addressed the pearl directly in such a manner. She says it like a name. Her voice is warm. The pearl has never once seen Pink Diamond smile at her like this, let alone heard it. She feels, for a moment, overwhelmingly real.
“Yes, my diamond?” Pearl says. She puts every ounce of unexpected purpose into the words, clasping her hands together so as not to salute.
Pink Diamond turns to her, still smiling, and makes eye contact once more. Pearl sees an instant of light before Pink Diamond wilts. The grand feeling that filled her chest so abruptly deflates alongside Pink Diamond’s fleeting joy. She’s done it again. What, she doesn’t know - everything about her should have been perfect, and she’s tried so very hard to execute her purpose - but Pink Diamond is unhappy once more, and once more Pearl is the cause.
Pink Diamond’s next meeting with Blue and Yellow Diamonds takes place in Yellow Diamond’s study.
“About Spinel,” Pink Diamond says, only for Blue Diamond to cut her off.
“Isn’t she just flawless?”
“She’s very,” Pink Diamond glances at Pearl, and Pearl sees the edge of her mouth twitch, “entertaining.”
Yellow Diamond laughs, loud enough to jar the pearls. “Ha-ha! Entertaining! Of course she is. Perfect for you.”
A shadow crosses Pink Diamond’s features. Thankfully, Pearl no longer has her attention. “Thanks, Yellow. Blue. She’s just what she’s supposed to be.”
“She’s the first real gem we’ve had made for you, isn’t she?” Blue Diamond says. “Stars only know why it’s taken so long.” Pink Diamond looks at Pearl again, but says nothing.
Blue Diamond continues. “Speaking of. We’ve read your message, Pink.”
“Ah, yes,” says Yellow Diamond.
Pink Diamond cheers at last. “Oh? What do you think?”
“I think this conversation calls for a little more privacy,” says Blue Diamond. “That will be all, Pearl.”
”You too,” says Yellow Diamond to her own. Both pearls bow to their Diamonds and exit Yellow Diamond’s room.
Pearl looks to Pink Diamond, who inclines her chin just a fraction, glancing to the others. “Go on. I’ll be right out.”
With that, they are inexplicably barred from the Diamonds’ concursion. Pearl squints at the other two. They haven’t moved, so she doesn’t either. She’s only spoken with the other pearls the once, when they’d introduced themselves, and never all alone like this. Pearl has never been brought along only to retroactively become left behind. She supposes she’ll follow their lead until she has a sense of the situation. Blue catches her staring.
“Go on, you can ask.”
Pearl permits herself the truth. “Why are we out here?”
“Didn’t you hear them?” says Yellow.
“The bit about making real gems?”
“Yes, actually,” says Blue. It‘s hard to tell, but Pearl thinks she looks a bit surprised.
“After that. The bit about privacy,” Yellow replies.
Pearl doesn’t want to admit that her inherent information has once again proven inadequate. She falls back on what little she does understand. “Well, I know I’m meant to accompany Pink Diamond today. Now I’m told to stay out here. You have to admit it’s unexpected.” Why bring her along in the first place?
“‘It’s unexpected’, she says,” Yellow scoffs. “Straight out of her shell.“
“You know that the Diamonds prefer to speak alone sometimes,” says Blue. “Without even their pearls.”
That doesn’t seem right, but then again, a reminder of her presence has never failed to make Pink Diamond miserable. Maybe she doesn’t want to be around other gems. It‘s the first answer Pearl has ever received, the first personal curiosity she’s spoken aloud instead of combing through data, and the sheer momentum of being responded to pushes another straight out of her head. “What do you mean by ‘yes, actually’?”
Yellow casts Blue a look. Blue offers her a fractional shrug in return. She addresses Pearl. “You know why pearls are made differently from other gems, right?”
“What? How are we made?” Pearl says.
Blue’s hands fly to her mouth.
Pearl jumps in place. She glances from Blue to Yellow in horror, but Yellow’s frown hasn’t budged. She’s tapping her foot as though simply waiting for Blue to catch up in the hallway. Blue’s fingers dig into her cheek.
“What’s happening to her?” says Pearl. “Should we do something?”
“Don’t worry, this is normal,” says Yellow. “She wasn’t thinking. You must remember to come at it sideways, Blue.”
“Please excuse me,” Blue says when she finally pries each digit away from her face.
“Are you alright?” Pearl says.
“She’s fine,” says Yellow.
“That’s what a secret looks like,” Blue says. “You’ll have a few of your own, soon enough.”
Pearl hopes not. It had looked unpleasant, although brief. Blue has a knuckle pressed to her lip now, deep in thought.
“This one’s not all that secret, but this is inconvenient for you and I. Big picture, then,” says Yellow. “Just lead her back to the Reef. Let her put it together.”
“The Reef?” Pearl says, but Yellow shakes her head and refuses to expound.
“I’m not so foolish as to play these games, if no one’s told you anything yet,” she says. “Let her try to explain it if she wants.”
Pearl can hear Yellow Diamond in conversation on the other side of the door. “Maybe this can wait,” she says, though in truth she wants Blue to continue. She had been made with just the right gem placement for thinking, and the notion of secrets is something new to think about, as is this strange fact about pearls. She can probably find the information just as easily in Pink Diamond’s files somewhere. She already knows the process by which many gems - useful ones, at least - are made. Analyzing her own creation might enable Pearl to finally decipher and correct her perpetual misbehavior, and thereby ensure her continued existence. Or at least it might enable her to stop anticipating the end of it.
“Big picture...” Blue taps her chin. “Colonies. Your Diamond would like one of her own very badly. Do you know anything about that process yet?”
Does she know anything? To lead a colony is the purpose of a Diamond and one of the few subjects Pink Diamond has shown even a scrap of interest in. Naturally, Pearl has reviewed as much as she can of the logistics involved. She’s pieced together whatever there is of Blue and Yellow’s dominion among the scattered documentation Pink Diamond has access to. Even if it would be hazardously bold to claim so aloud, at present, she probably knows more about how to run a colony than the diamond herself.
“I do!” Pearl says.
“Wonderful. Tell me.”
Pearl hesitates, unsure by what metric her knowledge will be measured. “Should I say it to you step-by-step? O-or a particular process? Selection, warp installation, kindergarten development-”
“Let’s skip the first,” says Blue. “After choosing a planet, who’s the most valuable gem of a new colony? Say for the first five or so centuries. Disregard whoever’s in charge, of course.”
“This is going to take forever,” Yellow groans.
Pearl stares at her hands, mentally revisiting inventory reports. “A sapphire, perhaps?”
“‘Most valuable’, not highest-ranking.”
“What common gem could possibly be of comparable value to a sapphire?”
Yellow interjects. For someone who claims to stay out of this, she hasn’t stopped sticking her nose in. “They’re worthless to new colonies. A sapphire’s ability is only useful when she’s around other gems.“
Pearl frowns, but Blue nods her on. “You know this. Think about it. She’s usually the first they send once a location is deemed viable. The only gem capable of traversing galaxies in a timely manner without use of the warp.”
Ah. “A lapis lazuli,” says Pearl. “Quite powerful, and costly to replace.”
“Good job. What does a lapis do?”
“Terraforms, of course,” Pearl says, repeating words all gems are made with. “That’s also why they’re designed to be sent out ahead. I’m afraid I don’t understand where you’re going with this. Or why you have to tell it to me in riddles. What does a lapis lazuli have to do with gem production?”
Blue just grins at her. “Why does a lapis terraform?”
“That’s what it’s made for,” she says. Obviously. Gems only exist to fill a purpose. A carefully-repressed edge leaks into her tone at last. The other pearl is as calm as the sea.
Yellow peeks at the doors, still shut. “I know you want to avoid setting your secrets off again, Blue, but you should either try and get her to the point immediately or leave it for now.”
“Yes, but how does she do it?” presses Blue.
“Lapis lazuli gems have the power to manipulate water,” Pearl says, knowledge sharp, patience thin. “It’s what makes them the most efficient tool for establishing colonies.”
“And why they’re so costly. You’re very close,” Blue says. “What does the invention of a water-wielding terraformer say about planets selected for colonization?”
“They’ve... got water?” Pearl says.
“Blue,” warns Yellow. This time Blue, too, glances back in the direction of Yellow Diamond’s chambers.
“Two more, and then I think your Diamond will be done for the day. First: you know what a completed colony should look like?”
“Yes, of course,” Pearl says, imagining the hologram she’d provided Pink Diamond in their quarters just before this meeting. “Efficient extraction of all available resources. When the site can no longer be of use in creating new gems, where possible it continues to serve as an extension of the empire’s network to further future development.”
“There’s the answer to your question. Here’s the last of mine,” Blue says. “Why does White Diamond have a pearl?”
“Blue.”
The doors slide open behind them and all three pearls stop talking. Blue and Yellow quietly resume their positions along the wall, Pearl just a half-step behind. Pink Diamond storms out alone, trailing the exasperated exclamations of the other Diamonds. Pearl hastens to assume her proper place, silent once more.
“See you soon,” whispers Blue.