Original summary of 2015 attempt: "Steven learns a little more about Rose Quartz and her strange ways. He also learns something quite surprising about himself. AU stemming from "Rose's Scabbard"."

"Do you remember this place? Do you have any of her memories?" Pearl said, as she held onto the grass, sitting down on one of those floating platforms that seemed to litter the Earth.

As she said this, Steven looked around where she had gotten him once more. It was hard to see anything on the ground in nighttime, especially since he was so high up, so he turned to Pearl. He never questioned why he knew her, because he had her since he was born, so he allowed her to continue. She stood up and said: "We were right here, over five thousand years ago." She projected a hologram of Steven's mother, Rose Quartz, next to herself, so that for Steven, she was behind her. Pearl then knelt over the projection.

She thus spoke, in a voice slightly different from her own, and the holographic Rose imitated the lip movements. "Pearl..."

"Yes?" Pearl responded, in her original voice.

"I'm going to stay and fight for this planet. You don't have to do this with me."

"But I want to!" Pearl almost jumped at the opportunity, and Steven began to think that maybe he did know of this already. The idea was still preposterous, since he wasn't here "over five thousand years ago", but his gemstone was, after all.

"I know you do. Please, please understand: if we lose, we'll be killed, and if we win..." Steven struggled to find an ending for this sentence, and suddenly it clicked in his head, really placing him in the memory... and outside his body.

"...we can never go home."

Suddenly, the Rose Quartz hologram disappeared, and Pearl stood up and turned to Steven. "How did you know?"

Steven just shrugged, still not entirely sure what is going on, especially since his sensation returned. "How did you know? How do gems have memories at all?"

Pearl sat down. It had been so long since she left Homeworld, where she hypothetically could have asked this to another gem, but it was likely that many other gems didn't know, and that she, as a servant class gem, wasn't even meant to know. "Hmm." she mused to herself.

As Steven watched her, though, he seemed to be overtaken by a different essence. It was the same essence that he tapped into when reproducing the memory, but at the same time it seemed to be hostile, wanting the body for itself.

Steven thus spoke, not of his own will. "I need some alone time now."

Pearl stood up and looked at Steven, once again. "But aren't you curious about how gems work?"

"It wasn't me! I swear!" Steven threw up his arms in defense.

"What do you mean, it wasn't you?" Pearl gave Steven a weird look.

"It just felt like... someone else was in my body and..." When trying to explain what he felt, Steven quickly ran out of words.

"But then... if it isn't you..." Pearl shivered due to the revelation, but finally had the courage to ask: "Rose Quartz?"

"Yes?" The feeling within Steven had returned.

"Is it you there... inside Steven?"

But just as quickly as she had come, she had gone, and Steven was back. "Didn't she tell me that she was going to become half of me? In that video tape?"

"What video tape?" Pearl's awe had suddenly turned into confusion, and the hopes of meeting Rose again had died down.

"The one in Lion's mane. It was apparently meant for me. My mom recorded herself on video! Isn't that cute?"

"Alright, so... if Rose is literally half of you, does that mean that... she could return?" Pearl began piecing together facts to conclusions.

"Um... as I said, I want to sort this out all by myself." Steven politely asked.

"Oh, okay. See you!" Pearl jumped from the platform onto the subsequent platforms, sometimes skipping a few and muttering something inaudible to herself. Steven thus concluded that she was excited about being able to meet Rose again. So was he.

But then the reality came over him, as he realized that the sensation had subsided, and he was as in control of his own body as ever.

Steven sat down at the grass, thinking about what happened to him. Apparently, the other essence came to him three times: once when he was trying to recount a memory by Rose, once when he was thinking about gems, and once when he was intensely looking at Pearl.

He quickly drew the conclusion that these three were connected by the fact that he had been feeling particularly strong emotions that Rose would feel. Therefore, for the process, he would need something that was highly personal for Rose.

Of course, he immediately knew where to look for it. He stood up and looked at Lion, who was still sitting next to the floating platforms at ground level, and called out his name. Lion thus teleported himself to the platform where Steven was and stood down. Steven looked back at his surroundings and noticed that Pearl had left the sword inside the scabbard back. He assumed that she wanted to bring them back to Lion. Thus, he picked up the scabbard, took a deep breath and dove inside Lion's mane.

Once he was in the alternate dimension, he swam to the island hosting various random objects. Once he got up there, he dropped the sword and looked around, thinking in his typical fashion: If I was my mom, which of these objects would be the most personal to me? The bubbled gem? Nah, it doesn't even look like anything. The Mr. Universe t-shirt? Who even wears something this big?

Steven's eyes then looked down and noticed a photo in a pink frame, next to the big chest (of the literal kind, not of the breast kind). He could make out Greg, eating a hot dog, together with Rose. He decided that this was sentimental enough, and once he held it, he climbed down the island. He was sure to be careful, since the last thing that he wanted was to roll down the hill, then roll across the platform and jump down at least several hundred feet.

Once he was back on the platform, he took a closer look at the frame. Rose looked almost as beautiful as the framed painting of her that was hung at the Crystal Temple, while Greg was considerably less pretty, especially since he had begun losing his hair, but nonetheless, there was something in him. The hot-dog reminded Steven of his own habits of eating donuts, as well as that phrase about the pork chops, while the eyebrows were in a certain strange shape, almost like his own. Even the hair, if you didn't count the appearing bald spots, was almost as good as his... as hers... as his.

Suddenly, once Steven had focused on Greg, he felt the same sensation of his soul being taken away from him. He continued to look at Greg, and once exactly half of his soul was taken away, someone else spoke, in his voice, but certainly not in his way: "Isn't he beautiful?"

"Oh, hey, mom." Inadvertently, Steven placed the picture down, expecting his mother to be somewhere nearby. He even looked around and called out: "Mom?" He remembered, though, that Rose wouldn't necessarily know what Steven sounded like, and instead tried something different. "Rose?"

After some time in his own body, though, he realized what was going on. "Oh, right, the picture." He thus sat down and began intensely looking at the picture again, just so he could feel the out-of-body sensation again.

"Steven?" The voice called out.

"Hey, mom! I suppose that you did say that you're going to become half of me, but I didn't expect it to be this literal." Steven tried to stay calm in this situation, and this time, he kept his focus on the picture.

"Why do you keep looking at the photo?" Rose asked in Steven's voice, once again.

"Apparently you go away if I stop looking at it." Steven was trying to keep his body to show all his expressions, but it was difficult with both of his hands holding the frame.

"So, this is a limitation now." Rose mused.

"I wouldn't know. This is the first time we've met." Steven shook it off.

"I never thought it would be like this. I expected a much more peaceful retirement, amongst pink clouds and everything... not sharing a body with another soul. Oh, if I would have known this..."

"I know what you mean. It's like that time when I was fused with Connie."

"Who is Connie?" Rose was interested. For someone who was in the same gem as Steven, she was surprised to know that she didn't actually share any of his memories.

"Oh, she's just a human friend of mine."

"You can fuse with humans?" Rose made Steven gasp. It was a bit difficult to parse whose emotions were whose, as they still shared a body, but they both decided that they would get used to it.

"Yeah! And when we fused, we kept talking over each other in the fusion. We couldn't quite get the hang of it. And I guess it's a bit like this now."

"Have you tried fusing with a gem yet?"

"No... They would probably think that it was inappropriate. Especially Pearl." Steven sighed.

"How is Pearl, anyway? She seemed to be the most heartbroken about my pregnancy." Rose twisted Steven in such a way that both became worried for Pearl.

"Yeah, just about right now we had an argument about how she misses you and how she wishes to talk to you again."

The Rose part remained silent. Though, it still had the same control over Steven.

"Do you miss her?"

"I suppose that there would be some... unfinished amends we need to resolve. Provided that she's feeling fine."

"Well, sort of. You see, she just learned that you have a lion, that I'm now taking care of, and-"

"You mean Leo?" Rose wanted to look back at the ground, just to see the creature once again, but knew that if she had lost focus of the picture, she would disappear.

"That's his name?"

"That would be right. In my last days, once I figured out that you might not inherit all my gem powers, I was able to tap into a corrupted gem and store my belongings there. But you already know that, right?"

"Yeah! And now I store stuff there too."

"I knew you would make good use of Leo." Both Rose and Steven smiled simultaneously.

"Anyway, so you said you wanted to talk to Pearl again, right?"

"Steven... I'm not sure if you even want this, but-"

"But what?"

"You see, I..." Rose was at a loss of words, not being able to assure Steven that everything would be okay. A certain uncertainty surrounded everything that she thought of.

"It's okay. You can always confide in little Stevie."

"If I come back, I just don't want to lose you."

"What do you mean?"

"If I wanted, I could return to my own form, but I'm not sure if you could revert the process. You can shapeshift, right?"

"Eh, I tried once, but then cat heads began growing on my body and dad had to help in washing them away." Steven wanted to laugh, but then was reminded of the horrifying memories.

Rose, though, didn't seem to mind, instead being curious about Steven's everyday life. "You mean your father Greg? Washing them away?"

"He owns a car wash now. He's the only source of money for our family."

"I knew he could do it." Rose once again used Steven's body to giggle. "In any case, that is just a common side-effect of shapeshifting, when your entire body is not relaxed. Since I would be focusing on it, I could definitely do it. I just wanted to know if your body was capable of it, being organic and everything."

"Oh. But?"

"But, once I was done making amends, you would have to return by repeating the process I did."

"We'll figure it out. You really need to talk to Pearl first and everything."

"You seem much like me when I was younger. I would always jump to danger, especially when I was told there was an uncontrolled planet that needed conquering."

Steven suddenly laughed, briefly coming out of focus with the picture. He made to quickly look back at it, though. He had realized that the "uncontrolled planet" was Earth, and that Rose had stopped in her tracks when she noted the beauty of Earth. They briefly shared another moment of laughter, before becoming rather serious about Earth - and about their crazy plan for her to meet up with the Crystal Gems once again.

"Alright, Steven. Are you ready?"

"One last thing. What do you exactly mean by the whole shapeshifting process? What's it like being in my gem, anyway?"

"Wow. Um..." Just as Steven had trouble expressing himself when the new sensation came over, so was Rose not the best person in explaining it, especially since their situation was unique. "It's pretty much as if you were a different being with different memories, and even different body parts. What is that thing dangling between your legs, anyway?" Yes, Rose really had to dive there. She was pretty much as immature and excitable as Steven was, very occasionally. They shared more in common than it would seem at first sight, and it was a shame that they shared too much.

"Er..." Steven felt uneasy about jumping straight to the difficult questions.

"Nevermind me, I know already. Greg has one, after all."

"Oh, okay. So, are you just going to do your shapeshift thing and make the amends and everything?"

"Only if you're absolutely ready."

"Alright, bring it on."

"What I'll need you to do is to focus on the picture with all your mentality, and in particular look at Greg, not myself. Understood?"

"Gotcha. So, goodbye, mom?"

"Later, Steven." With those last words, Steven looked at the picture even more intensely, almost holding it to his face, but still remaining fairly calm. It was still nighttime, so it was kind of hard to note all the intricate details of the picture, but surely, Steven was able to notice the regularity of the teeth in the hot dog and the thick eyebrows, almost as thick as his own.

And, with that notion, Steven's body began glowing and underwent a transformation.

He immediately noted that he grew significantly taller, and with that every part of his body became thicker. His hair began growing heavier, and only due to luck the curls (which were also becoming bright pink) did not get in the way between the eyes and the picture. His face also seemed to get heavier, especially on his lips. His upper torso showed growth in two parts symmetrical from the chest area, and his clothes changed appropriately to fit and partially expose the protrusions, in the process getting brighter. In his lower half, the clothing surrounded and swept away his usual shorts, making a beautiful multi-leveled skirt. It also appeared as if grass was growing right underneath him; that was his sandals disappearing and leaving him barefoot. Lastly, part of the clothing unwrapped the belly, where the gem was, and it became surrounded by a star-shaped hole in the dress.

Steven immediately wanted to check out this new body, but felt that he couldn't move anything anymore. In fact, he had a hard time even thinking about himself. As he - nay, she - stood now, the form of her body was indistinguishable from that of Rose Quartz. In fact, it was Rose Quartz - and just as she had originally, after his birth, been an observer of his life, so was he condemned to be subject of everything that Rose did.

Rose Quartz looked away from the picture containing her dearest memories and began to survey the surroundings.

It was a part of the Strawberry Battlefield, where she fought over five thousand years ago. But right then and there, the memories came to her as if it was yesterday. She and Pearl were standing on this very platform, during the night before the biggest battle, conversing so that they would be sure that their compatriots were alright.

"Please, please understand: if we lose, we'll be killed, and if we win, we can never go home." She felt herself saying.

"But why would I ever want to go home, if you're here?" The voice of Pearl rang back to her, reminding her of everything that she loved about her sole confidante.

"My Pearl."

"You're wonderful..."

She then held out her hand, as if Pearl was really there. However, instead of Pearl there was still the picture of herself and Greg. With that, she was also reminded that comparing her love to Pearl and her love to Greg would be impossible; both had aspects of their own which complemented each other.

But right now, Greg didn't matter. Steven had specifically mentioned that Pearl was heartbroken, and therefore, Pearl had to be taken care of first.

Rose swiftly jumped from the platform and onto where Leo was. She was able to do this in a single leap, since she could float and everything. She then went inside Leo and put the photo back to its original place, next to the chest where she had various other paraphernalia. She was about to go back out, but caught an eye of her Mr. Universe tee. She considered wearing it briefly, but decided against it, because otherwise Pearl wouldn't recognize her.

Rose thus went back out and patted Leo, who was still sitting there, as he was doing it for a couple of hours. "Steven has really trained you, hasn't he?" She chuckled to herself again and walked over to the warp pad, ready to go back to the Crystal Temple to meet her lifelong friends.

Author's idiotisms: Because "if Steven poofs, Rose Quartz will come back and Steven will never be able to come back" isn't nearly dark enough for my standards.

Anyway! More of Rose Quartz and her Crystal Gem/human baby. Hope you enjoy.

Update #1: Not as major as you think it is. At the request of "Demon Monkey".