Blue had been silent for a long while. Her chest ached and her knees were weak, more drained than they had ever been before. Gazing up from her chair, she saw the light of Homeworlds star falling through the hole left by her palanquin. She had not even spared a thought for it, she was still struggling to consider that she would've ever had the chance to see her again.

She had spent thousands of years waiting for this day, waiting for answers, and all she had been given was more questions. Inbetween her grief, all her thought had been focused on finding her, understanding her, and finally destroying her.

That zircon was supposed to defend her, that is what she ordered her to do. And that she did, better than she ever imagined she could. It had hurt her, that day, she was left so empty without Pink, that she never stepped back and took in the facts. She damned herself, she may as well have been the last gem in the galaxy to see it.

Blue saw Rose Quartz, she became used to seeing that face during the Rebellion. She was persistent, unpredictable, possessive of daring far beyond her station. She made countless attempts on her entourage over the centuries, and every single time she would fail to reach her, only to one day try again, with more soldiers by her side and Blues court stretched that much thinner.

Homeworld was drained by the Rebellion, but paid every cost to counter Rose Quartz's movement. And for Pink...Blue would only accept her having the best, the finest guards, the most prescient sapphires. Rose Quartz was a terror. But even she couldn't do some things.

...whoever did this was already close to Pink Diamond. Someone her guards would allow her to get near her. Someone she would listen to when asked to stop her palanquin and step outside...

It was only when they were together when they would walk on Earth. That was what was agreed between the three of them, and Pink, for all her naivety in youth, never went against it.

...and someone with the authority to cover it up afterwards! Someone with supreme authority...

She hadn't seen the Earth for years when that day came, Rebellion or not she still had her corner of the empire to rule. It had exhausted her, as much as a Diamond could be exhausted, and she regularly delayed her return to the frontlines at the news they were finally squeezing the rebels out of their holes. She wanted the victory to be Pinks, and to come back to the sight of her restarting the colony anew. The only help Pink was given in those last years was...

"Blue!"

...someone...like one of YOU!

"Blue, are you listening to me?!", shouted Yellow Diamond, standing in front of Blue, surrounding by holographic screens. Her stare had an element of rage bubbling below the surface, still flush from the argument that let Rose Quartz escape.

Blue looked her in the eye.

Yellow continued, in a rushed tone of command. "I have every robonoid in the sector set to search every single crevice that Rose Quartz could hide in, with every other sector sending all spare robonoids on the planet! I need you to order your sapphires to begin looking for possible places she could go, can you do that for me, will you?!"

"Yes.", replied Blue, focused on keeping an eyelock with Yellow, "Yes, I can."

Yellow nearly barked another order, before she caught herself and breathed. "Good. I will alert the fleet, we cannot let any ship leave the system.", she turned and made way to the warp pad, her pearl following beside her. "She has played us for fools, she probably handed herself in so she can start another rebellion in the underbelly of our own capit-"

"Yellow."

Yellow turned to Blues voice. "What is it, Blue?"

Blue stared directly at Yellows pearl. "Your pearl has my zircon."

Yellow turned to look down at her pearl, who was silently suffering under Blues gaise while holding two zircon gems, the Defense and the Prosecution of the trial. Yellow returned to facing Blue, "Yes, she is to be shattered."

Blue's eye twitched at this. "And on what grounds?"

Yellow let out a loud, solitary, joyless laugh. "Have you forgotten the Laws of the Diamonds? A zircon that fails in her case is subject to shattering."

"Subject to shattering, her Diamond has the right to pardon her, and I am her Diamond.", countered Blue, "And the trial hasn't ended, we haven't given a verdict."

"Oh for-", started Yellow, before animating her voice into a hasty delivery of justice. "'I, Yellow Diamond, declare Rose Quartz guilty of the shattering of Pink Diamond, sentencing her to shatterment.', there, case closed, now I have to catch that traitor before this whole show becomes worse than a complete waste of time!"

"I am not satisfied, Yellow!", retorted Blue, raising her voice, "She must be captured and brought here, I will never be at peace until I know how Pink was killed!"

Yellow took a step forward.

"She was killed by the leader of that rebellion we allowed to grow on that miserable speck of dirt, and now she's here on our world ready to start the war all over again! If she delivers herself in chains, begging for the Hammer, then I might extend her irritating little existence a while longer, but I'm through with delaying in any other case, now it's shatterment on sight!", now her voice was not much below a booming howl, "Don't you want to destroy Rose Quartz?!"

Blue stood up from her chair, becoming eye-level with Yellow.

"I want to destroy the one who shattered my sister."

For a moment, Yellow was puzzled by this, before her firm and straight posture buckled under, of all things, a quiet chuckle. "Really, Blue, after thousands of years, you're now going to follow the word of a treasonous zircon?"

"'Her word' was enough to scare you."

Yellow was silent. She slowly turned to her right, and began to walk to the wall on the side of their courtroom. On the final step, she raised a balled fist behind her, slamming it into the wall. The whole room shook, cracks formed in crosses from the epicentre of impact on the wall, a ray of light piercing through a small hole when Yellow took away her hand.

"What do you know about what scares me? You've never cared about anything but yourself for thousands of years. I don't know why I expect you to start now."

Blue felt her inside churn under the hard glare of Yellow, and somehow she felt that on any day before this one it would've been enough to put her to the ground.

She stayed standing.

"I care about Pink, and I care about you. You've always told me to move on from her death, and this...', she raised her arms to gesture to the whole room, cavernous to any forms other than them, "...this was how I was going to do it. I wanted to make sure that that day never happened again. That zircon I appointed wasn't my best, she was the one that was most committed, the one who would even defend Rose Quartz and make sure her side was heard. And because I had insisted on this...", her covered her face with her hand, barely able to keep looking at Yellow, "I've never thought of that day so clearly before. It doesn't make sense, Yellow. You were made to be the rational one, surely you see it, the both of us lived through countless attacks by Rose Quartz, so did Pink!"

As Blue looked back up, she could see Yellow dropping her eyes to the floor as well. "You torture yourself, Blue. Pink was young, the young think they are immortal. It's as simple as that. And that zircon of yours, she almost certainly turned to Rose Quartz's side during recess, that little stunt she did with summoning your palanquin was obviously to give Rose and her human a way out. She's a turncoat as well as a slanderer, that can't be pardoned. Our word is Law."

Blue once again stared into Yellows eyes, and took a few steps forward, forcing Yellow to stare back. "Our word, or yours?"

For a moment, aside from the quiet gusts of wind coming in from the large holes in the walls and ceiling, the room was silent.

"Pearl.", announced Yellow, keeping her eyes on Blue and not turning to see the two pearls on the floor trembling in barely-restrained panic. Yellow's pearl answered, "Y-y-yes, My Diamond?"

"You will hand over the Defense to Blue's pearl.", Yellow ordered.

Wordlessly, one Pearl struggled with the gems in her hands, holding one out for the other to grab.

"Alright, Blue. Fine, you can have your zircon. See if I care what ridiculous ideas you need to stay half-functional."

Blue maintained her half of the stare. "All for the best that you don't care. It is good to see you are not afraid of ridiculous ideas."

Yellow was the first to turn away. "I will alert the fleet." Followed by her Pearl, Yellow walked to the warp pad, the two disappearing in a column of light.

Blue leaned down to the floor, placing her right hand palm-up in front of her pearl, now holding the zircon. "My Pearl.", she said, in a tone she tried to make smoother and calmer.

"Yes, My Diamond?", the reply came, her Pearl, still visibly shaking, stepping onto her hand and sitting down along her middle finger.

Blue stood straight and gently ran her left index through her pearls hair. "I want this zircon well-protected until she reforms. I am very interested in hearing what else she has to say."