Tales Of Connections

Chapter 4: Back home.

"What happened?" Gwen wanted to know, as she looked down at Onyx's leg, it dribbling out blood, the blood being a mix of green and grey, with white sparkles across it. Onyx looked down at it. "I forgot it looks like that now," she said trying to keep herself upright. Pearl looked around. "Ava, what are you doing here?"

"The guardians kicked me out due to me overstepping my rolls,"

"I knew that, but like, what are you doing here, in this dimension? I thought they would've locked you up or something."

"Without my gauntlet, I'm not a threat. Take a look at what you just came out of, we've spent two months trying to rebuild this machine." onyx looked back at the dimensional cracker.

"You've been trying to rebuild the dimensional cracker?" onyx asked, her voice a mix of concern and frustration. "I wanted to rebuild it," Ava admitted. "I need to get back out there, and find Beth's mother."

"You know exactly what happened, and you wanted to recreate that?"

"Now is not the time." Charlie cut in, onyx confused by her appearance there. "You're hurt, meaning we've got a big bad."

"Right, it's cosmos," Onyx explained, as pyrite just slunk off into the corner, trying to stay out of the way of those who knew better. "COSMOS!?" Ava blurted out, having a mini heart attack. "You know this creep?" Charlie asked, tapping her foot. "Oh yeah, you weren't there for that conversation. He's Ava's adopted son. And the connected before onyx."

"And right now, he's fighting my family back in the citadel. We've got to do something." Ava began pacing back and forth. "He'll be after the cosmic crystals. We need to get back to HQ."

"The people who just fired you?" Pearl demanded to know.

"They have a constantly updating map of the crystals."

"That's a good enough reason, boot up the machine and let's get going."

"I said we almost had it working. How did you get back here?"

"I did it." onyx explained, pulling herself to a full stance. "I don't know how, but some instinct took over and I ripped open that portal myself."

Ava got down on a knee to meet her at eye level. "Do you think you could do it again?"

"Probably."

"Then I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to ask you to open one back up this time back to HQ."

"You're talking like I'm staying out of this."

"You're hurt."

"And that's never stopped me before," she said with a smirk, her cut had already begun to heal. "All right, fine. You can come with us. What about you Pearl? Are you coming?"

"I think I'll stay, just in case cosmos showed up. Somebody needs to be able to hold him off for a little while."

"Fair enough, I suppose. Come on Beth, let's get going." Beth just nodded her head and walked over to the pair, fist bumping with Onyx. "We're stronger together, right?" Onyx stated Beth followed it up with a handshake. "More than you'd think," Beth responded.

"Hold on, if you guys think you're going without the certified superhero here, then you're delusional."

"As classy as ever Charlie, let's go." onyx stated as she began to open up a portal, before she placed her hands into the portal and she ripped it open further. The four of them stepped through. After having stepped through, they were met by the sound of pure silence. Charlie slapped her back and pulled off her multi-tool. She got into a battle-ready stance, ready for whatever came. The other three were already moving. "So, why bring her with us?" Charlie asked about Beth. "because I trust Beth, and I'm getting her full guardian gauntlet, whether or not the guardians want me too or not." Beth smiled for a moment before they headed out to the main balcony, where they then found, the floor was flooded with bodies of guardians, either dead or unconscious, Ava looked on with pure horror, having to take a step back, breaking her usual, professional demeanour. "Hey, we're going to make sure cosmos pays for this," Onyx explained, meeting her at her now lower eye level as Ava had fallen to her knees. "Right, right," Ava explained getting up, having to push everything down because she's on the job. "Wow, you're kid did all this?" Onyx just lifted Charlie into the air, span her around a little bit, and dropped her to the ground. "Time and place." Onyx snarkily responded as Beth continued to look around. "we 've got to go to the elders." Ava nodded and they all began running, following Beth.