GaU Chapter 18 Snippet #2

Chapter 18: Not Human

Come on girl, think, think, think!

Sardonyx struggled in her restraints, the pink giant slowly walking towards her, palms still facing her. But no matter how hard she pulled, the pink tendrils grip on her arms wouldn't budge. If she was still fresh, she could've broken out of them, but with all the blows she'd taken, and the pink on her skin draining her strength by the minute, the idea of just breaking these pink restraints more and more impossible by the minute.

The giant suddenly clenched one of its hands into a fist. The pink tendrils on her arms suddenly started glowing, and then that same glow started to spread up her body. The bits of her skin that were already pink suddenly became pinker, and her exhaustion was suddenly a whole lot worse, darkness rising in her vision, eyes struggling to stay open as she slowly gained a pink paint job all over her body.

And all while the giant grew closer with each thundering step.

She had been in some pretty sticky situations in her time. Most of which came from the Gem War, some coming from dealing with the aftermath of that. But there never been a moment like this. One where she fought against some pink, ethereal giant with powers she’d never seen before, and did so while literally fighting inside her own head. A moment where, for the first time she…

Felt helpless.

Sardonyx was made up from Pearl and Garnet. Pearl always liked to say she was was the embodiment of all their best parts, and Sardonyx did too, but, well, that wasn’t completely true. A fusion was made of all parts of a pair of gems. Up to, and including, their doubts; their insecurities.

Their fears.

The base of her fears were the base of Pearl and Garnet’s. Feeling like she wasn’t good enough, or like she wouldn’t be able to handle what the future had in store. And in her case, their was a little extra layer of anxiety in that ‘wonderful’—read: awful—cake made of self-doubt and fear that was always their in the back of her head.

A fear that, if things ever got really bad, she wouldn’t live up to her own hype. That no wide smile, no dazzling flair or pizzazz, no big show stopping finishers, wouldn’t be able to help out her girls. That she’d fail to save them.

Like she had with countless other gems in the war.