Universe Falls (Steven Universe: Beyond the Future)

Feats of Strength

"STEVEN!!!!!", Mabel yelled from downstairs in hopes of startling him awake. She didnt wake Steven up, but her call was loud enough for him to hear her from the rooftop where he was checking out the view of the forest. He looked around to make sure nobody was watching and floated down from the roof.

"Hey Mabel, Dipper, what's up?", Steven said as he made his way down the stairs and into the kitchen. "Well, *Steven 😍* we were about to go to lazy Susan's Diner for breakfast and were wondering if you wanted to come along!", Mabel said. "You were wondering if he wanted to come along...", Dipper said under his breath. 'Lazy Susan isn't a very nice nickname for somebody', Steven thought. He then got snapped back to reality when he heard Dipper talk.  "What was that, Dipper?", Steven asked him. "Uh nothing!", he quickly replied. Although Steven didn't buy his act, he just decided to let it go.

They had arrived at Lazy Susan's, and fortunately everything in this town was close, like how it was in Beach City, so it wasn't a very long walk to get there. On the inside, there were tables filled with people and it was very welcoming inside. Steven figured that this must be the main place to eat in Gravity Falls if there were so many people here.

Steven got was about to get a table for them, but they already sat down at the booth that they usually did. Steven, realizing that he should probably let them take the lead, followed along. It didn't take long for a woman with pale hair and one eye closed to come over and take their orders. "Hey there, Mystery Twins!", she said. "Who do y'all have here?", she gestured towards Steven. "Hi, I'm Steven. I'm guessing you're 'Lazy Susan'?", Steven responded. "Well aren't you one smart fella?", she started "What can I get for you all today?", Lazy Susan asked before proceeding to take out her pencil and notepad and jot down orders. Dipper and Mabel got the Lumps, and Steven just got a salad. (He did want to try some Lumps though, he just wasn't sure what they were or if he'd like them.)

The twins and Steven sat there enjoying... whatever it was that they were eating when suddenly Mabel had a craving. A craving for some- "PANCAKES!", Mabel half-yelled (still keeping her tone of voice in mind since they were inside of a restaurant.) "Mabel, what are you talking about--", Dipper started but then immediately trailed off at the sight of the stack of pancakes a man had. It looked to be about as tall as a mountain! "Aw man, I wish we could get some of those pancakes...", Mabel started talking and looked down at her plate, poking around at the crumbs left on it. "Well, why can't you?", Steven asked, making Mabel shift her attention to Steven's little star earrings. "Well... it's because you have to win on the 'manly' strength meter, and that takes, well, strength that we don't have from a certain man at the table.", Mabel said. It was more than obvious who she was talking about.

"Well, I'll go win some for you then!", Steven said cheerfully as he began to pick himself from the bench. He started to walk over to the strength meter when a hand grabbed him. It was Mabel's. "Steven wait! You do know you have to be *really* strong to win that right? Like, they would just be giving out free pancakes left and right if you didn't", Mabel said. "Yeah, I tried it and even I failed, so I would know.", Dipper said. He was half-joking because even though he wasn't all that strong, from the looks of Steven's arms, Steven wasn't either and Dipper knew how embarrassed he was after getting the lowest score on the machine.

"Relax guys! I'll just waltz right up there and score some pancakes for us.", Steven said, assuring them that it would be fine. Honestly, even if by some miracle Steven wasn't able to win the machine, he wouldn't feel all that embarrassed. He'd been working to control his emotions with his therapist for a while anyways, and a bunch of people seeing that he might have put aside going to the gym for a little too long didn't really bother him much. 

Steven walked up to the machine with the mallet in his hand. "Hey look e'rybody! Some kid's 'bouta try the Manly meter!", a man from the bar yelled. Right after this was announced, basically all the eyes in the bar were on Steven. No going back now! Steven held the mallet up in his hand, only a little bit and pressed down. It seemed like he barely tapped it, and if you were there you would've sworn you'd seen a pink flash for just a split second, but the second the mallet hit the machine, the meter went soaring in the air! 

Everyone was shocked. Everyone was shocked, but Steven ended up scoring those pancakes.

As Steven waltz right on back to the bar, he didn't fail to notice almost everyone in the bar with a hanging jaw. He was confused for a second then obviously remember that he's foreign to this town and they didn't know about him. Steven happily acquired the pancakes for the twins. "HOW. I- YOU- THE HAMMER_??!", Dipper stammered. Nobody believed it. "Hey, I told you it'd be fine!" 

As Dipper and Mabel ate the celebratory pancakes, Dipper's mind couldn't help but to wander and ponder all the different theories that were going on his board about Steven. Superpowers? Vampire? Alien?

'No. That'd be silly.'