Brittle as Diamonds | Steven Universe

♢ Conditioned ♢

"Take them back to the Tower, now."

"I. Won't."

"Then I'll do it MYSELF."

♢♢♢

"You don't have to do this!"

"Yes I do! This is what White Diamond expects of ALL of us! From a thin flake of Mica, to the deepest, hardest, STONE! We all must make sacrifices, for the sake of our PERFECT EMPIRE!"

♢♢♢

"Your first colony was an utter failure."

        Yellow hung her head. She didn't need telling twice, but her superior seemed intent on reminding her of her shortcomings.

        "I don't understand how you could manage to forego every single instruction I gave you and make such a fool of yourself. There shouldn't be leeway for the inhabitants of a planet to rebel. You are conquering."

        The smaller Diamond remained silent. As much as it hurt, she knew she must bear the criticism.

        "Have you anything to say?"

        ". . . No."

        "You have embarrassed us. You have embarrassed me. You know what we must do with defective Gems, don't you?"

        She kept quiet. When she raised her head, White was glaring at her.

        "We shatter them," she made herself say, voice quiet.

        Even though she was only a head shorter than the largest Diamond, she felt so much smaller, so much more insignificant. Blue had done just fine on her first colony. Why couldn't she have done the same?

        Yellow knew she had been given the harder planet, but that should be no excuse.

        "We will talk later. You may go to your room."

        And she followed her orders, slinking away through the large white doors.

♢♢♢

". . . and all of you must be dealt with. You understand that our Empire must be flawless."

        Even though she detested what had to be done, Yellow made no objections to her superior. Across the room, Blue looked just as irked, but she wisely held her tongue.

        The Gems lined up in front of them gave their last salutes. The Amethyst looked on the verge of tears, arms framing her cracked gem.

        "You're disgusting. I hope you're shattered someday," someone spat.

        Yellow stiffened. Her eyes flicked down to a Lapis Lazuli, standing defiantly with her fists by her sides. The gem on her forearm was split but shone brightly.

      "6B, shatter them," White droned, and the Topaz she spoke to moved forward, brandishing her weapon.

        Yellow closed her eyes against the scene, but that did not stop her from hearing the sickening cracks of their gems being crushed.

♢♢♢

Her sixth colony had been a success, and yet Yellow had heard nothing from White in the last few hundred years. Was she not doing well enough? Did she need to exploit more planets?