Dance of Sapphire

Pearl

Rin missed Shiro.

Shiro had always known what to do. He'd always been there for Rin when Yukio hadn't. He'd taught Rin how to be a respectable person.

Rin wished he was here now. He had B's and C's in his regular day classes, but he was failing Cram School. It was too much information for his limited brain. Shiro had made a system that helped Rin understand things better and he'd always helped Rin with anything he struggled with.

Now, Rin was stuck with Yukio, who hated Rin's guts. Even before, he got too frustrated with Rin when trying to help him and Rin didn't want to be a nuisance, so he tried on his own. He just couldn't do it.

He hated that. He hated himself. He wanted to be better. He wanted to be able to make Yukio proud, or at least show him that he wasn't just a dumb lowlife who couldn't even learn how to be a proper Gem Warrior to avenge their adoptive father. To prove that Shiro didn't die for nothing. To prove that Rin was worth a life and his mother's gem–the very last Sapphire.

His pride was definitely going to suffer from this, but not nearly as bad as his grades and emotional state were if he didn't do this.

"Bon." Rin called. The teen looked up from the book on his desk only to scowl at the realization of who called him.

"I thought you didn't want to be around me." The Ruby sneered.

"I don't. But I need help and you're top of the class in most of Cram School. Now I just have to see if you actually have the patience to deal with me." Rin said honestly. The scowl deepened, but the teen gave his full attention to the Sapphire.

"And why should I help you?" He decided to mess with the smaller Gem before agreeing. "And don't call me Bon." He added as an afterthought.

"Because I'm literally the dumbest in the class besides the Peridot and I'm not planning on dropping out." Rin crossed his arms. The red Gem was still not buying it. Fine. Rin would just have to take it a step further. He let his shoulders drop and looked away.

"And this is the only place I have to live for now." He muttered. He could see the teen trying to figure out what that meant and cheered internally. Shiro was still a sore subject, but if Rin wanted to pass classes, he'd have to guilt trip Suguro into helping him.

"What exactly does that mean?" Suguro asked uncertainly. Rin shrugged, still not meeting the teen's eyes.

"The guy who adopted me and Yukio died a month ago. No one else can take care of us. Yukio already has a guaranteed graduation from this school, but I don't. I can barely pass regular day classes. As interesting as Gem History and Summoning Spells are, by the time I get to Cram School, my concentration is pretty much gone."

Silence for a moment. A heavy sigh.

"Alright, fine. But don't expect me to tolerate your whining when I make you study on the weekends." Suguro caved. Rin was already regretting this, but left before he could take it back.

§~•~§~•~§

"Ooh, you two are quite the power couple." Shura purred at Rin and Shima as they danced. It was the end of the month and they moved fluidly together. Rin was almost like a ballet dancer while Shima was more of a smooth tango and knew how to merge his own style of dancing with Rin's. It did help that the Citrine was charming and made small talk while they danced. Together, they'd made up something like a mix of ballet and salsa fusion dancing.

They did their best to ignore the woman and kept dancing. Suguro had pretty much no progress with Takara. The puppet boy didn't want to dance, so he just sat in the corner alone. As a result, Suguro would sometimes dance with Shiemi or Shura. Shura was too....lewd, so Shiemi was who he usually danced with if he could.

Kamiki and Shiemi were a great match. Shiemi's gentleness and Kamiki's bitchyness went well together.

Paku and Konekomeru were both plain and simple, so they danced well together too. Good progress was being made. They would have a test next week to see who could fuse and for how long, if any of them could fuse at all. Rin wasn't sure whether to be excited or scared. Would he fuse with Shima? What would they be? Who would they be? Who would be in control?

So many questions crowded his mind even later as he made dinner later that night.

When he was finally ready to go to sleep, he was too tired to think and gave up on freaking out over it. There would be more time to worry later.