Return From Limbo

Ch. 1: Shooting Stars Bring Painful Memories

Several years ago…

In the Crystal Temple, a man proceeded down a long corridor with a sole purpose in mind. When he came to the center of the Temple, he took a look around and saw his allies… his friends… his "siblings".

"Alright, listen up!" a Crystal Gem announced with authority, revealing the man to be a humanoid with green skin, orange spikey hair, a green gem on his forehead, wearing a long, green jacket with a star on the back, a black shirt, dark green pants and a pair of black boots. Every Gem in the room quickly stood in front of him as he addressed them. "As everyone knows by now, we are going to take the battle to the enemy on their own turf!" the Gem reminded his teammates as they gathered around him. Amongst those present was Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl. "Now while we go with the main force, a few of us will have to stay behind and take care of Rose and Earth. Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl have kindly accepted the task,"

In the midst of the announcement, a conversation among the three Crystal Gems formed, though for one, she far from happy to hear this decision.

"This isn't right. I should be joining up with the rest of the team," Pearl said in quiet protest. She had already made a fuss about it when she was "volunteered" to stay behind.

"Pearl, we already went over this," Amethyst reminded her friend. "Some of us have to stay behind and look after this planet and Rose, especially in her condition."

"Amethyst is right. Every single planet we defend has to," Garnet spoke with her usual serious demeanor. "We have to be ready in case something happens," Pearl didn't like it but she had to accept it.

"...Alright, I understand." Pearl reluctantly agreed. "I just hope that everyone returns safe from their mission."

"You worry too much, Pearl," Amethyst attempted to cheer up her friend. "Look at it this way; we get the all-important duty *snicker* of protecting Earth," Amethyst said trying not to laugh because of her own immaturity. Pearl, for her part, pondered for a moment, thinking what her friend just said to hear; after a moment, she sighed before turning her attention to Amethyst.

"I guess that is a good thing," Pearl agreed. As the gems continued to talk, another of the gems was looking on as he left the room. He had a look of shame on his yellow face as his vision focused on Pearl, who was unaware of his gaze. The gem then followed his gem teammates out the door and stepped on the teleport pad before disappearing towards their destination.

Present Day...

It was a beautiful, starry night at Beach City, especially near the Crystal Temple, home of the Crystal Gems and Steven Universe, the newest member of the team. Amethyst and Garnet were trying to fix the teleporter which seemed to be having technical issues they couldn't explain. But for Pearl, it was anything but a pleasant night for her; whenever she had the chance, Pearl would often come out and stand atop the cliff to view the ocean, before looking up at the sky, as if waiting for something to show up any second now.

'Where are you? It shouldn't have taken this long,' Pearl thought as she scanned the night sky, looking for anything.

"He isn't coming back, you know," the voice startled Pearl, causing her turn around and see Garnet behind her, straight faced and serious as always. "It's been a long time. Even you have to doubt he's still alive,"

"Shouldn't you be working on the teleporter?" Pearl asked.

"Shouldn't you?" Garnet countered.

"Fair enough," Pearl admitted, "I'll admit I'm not so sure whether he made it out alive," Pearl confessed to her friend, before she took a deep breath before explaining. "But until I see proof of his demise, I'm going to hope for the best."

Garnet nodded her head in response, understanding Pearl's reasons. She herself also hopes for not only his survival but all her comrades, but after so many years had passed, she eventually had to accept that the chance of any of them coming back alive is slim to none.

Suddenly, Garnet, as well as Pearl, spotted something coming out of the sky. It looked like a shooting star as it passed over the sky, with a bright tale following behind. Though as the star continued to fall, it appeared to get bigger and seemed to be heading straight for the temple. Eventually, the shooting star slammed straight towards the beach, creating a loud explosion in the process, alerting those who heard it, and leaving a huge crater in the beach.

"Guys, what happening?!" asked a startled Amethyst as she ran out of the beach house and went out to check up on her friends, alongside Steven. "What's attacking us now?!" She said as Garnet and Pearl finally meet up with them, a few dozen meters from the crater.

"Where did that come from?!" Steven nervously asked the Gems as they all ran to the crater.

"Steven, stay back! We don't know what that thing is yet!" Pearl instructed sternly, making sure Steven didn't have any chance to be harmed. Steven listened as he took a few steps back as the Gems inspected the crash site. The bystanders who were awoken by the explosion were showing up as well.

"Stand back people! This is Gem business here!" Amethyst informed the crowd, as she, along with her teammates, made their way to where the "shooting star" landed. Everyone simultaneously took five steps back, expecting the worse.

Upon their arrival, the trio gasped in surprise; within the impact crater was an unconscious Crystal Gem laying on the ground, surrounded by a bubble that most likely absorbed most of the impact before disappearing right before their eyes shortly afterwards. The gem had blue hair that seemed to stand up on its own, yellow skin, an orange hoodie, purple pants with two yellow gems sticking out of both sides of his hips, and blue shoes. His clothes were badly torn and he seemed like he was attacked by a soot monster, as he was not only covered in dust and dirt, but he had some cuts on his legs and arms that had some yellow blood coming out of them. The moment they saw the unconscious Gem, it didn't took too long for any of them to realize who it was.

"Is that who I think it is?" Amethyst finally asked, still in a state of shock.

"Y-Yes Amethyst, it is who you think it is." Pearl replied, a bit shaken upon seeing the figure.

"Right now, we need to get him to the Crystal Temple," Garnet insisted, to which her teammates agreed, before Garnet jumped into the crater and slung the gem onto her shoulder and jumped back out. "He's still breathing," Garnet informed her friends, as the three quickly rushed to the temple with the unconscious gem while a confused Steven tried to keep up with them.

"Hey guys, what's going on?!"

But the trio didn't answer his question right away, as they still continued to head to the temple. Pearl span the star on the door around, changing the gem colors from the normal ones to five new ones; yellow, green, blue, light red, and white before they quickly opened the door to rush him inside, with Steven following them in before the door closed right behind him. The room was orange in color and was quite bright. Three targets of various sizes hung on the wall while a wooden dummy coated in armor that was covered in what looked like slash marks. A few sword racks were up against the wall with each slot filled with a different sword. A hammock was hung from two crystal poles in the room that led out of the room.

"Lay him down on the hammock," Garnet instructed her teammates, as Pearl and Amethyst carefully helped her set the gem down gently.

"Amethyst, get me a medical box right away!" Pearl ordered, to which her friend nodded her head and made her way to the nearest container, before she opened it and retrieved the medical box from within.

"Got it, Pearl!" Amethyst announced her presence, before handing her teammate the medical box. Without any hesitation, Pearl opened it up and took a few bandages on the most injured parts from the unconscious gem, his legs and his lower arms.

Steven, meanwhile, could only look on as the Gems did their best to heal the stranger up, expressing both confusion and concern. Not only was he looking at another crystal gem… but this one was male like him; something he never saw before. After continuing to stare at the unconscious gem for a few more minutes, Steven finally decided that he needed some answers right away.

"Guys…" Steven began, as the gems were finished patching up the stranger. "Who is he? Why is he a Crystal Gem? Do any of you know him?" Steven said quickly as he was eager to learn as much as he could about the gem laying in the hammock. But the moment Steven began to ask, however, he noticed that the trio's expression were anything but happiness, much to his surprise.

"Was it something I said?" Steven finally asked with uncertainty.

"No, it wasn't," Pearl replied. "But if you must know, this here is Topaz; the last person I wanted to see," As Pearl answered Steven's question, her tone and demeanor suddenly became dark, as an expression of pure disdain for this gem came to her face.

"He's a troublemaker like me, though some of the stuff he does is more questionable than what I do," Amethyst explained with a tone of annoyance, as if she was speaking from a past experience.

"But he's also loyal to the gems," Garnet concluded.

As Steven listened on, he took note on the expression from the gems; of the three, Pearl showed the most change in her personality, Amethyst seemed a bit indifferent while Garnet was hard to read, as she always maintained her stoic personality. The only thing that Steven was able to catch on was their tone regarding Topaz, speaking about him in some negative way, though Garnet's response was the only one that didn't leave him mystified.

'I wonder what Topaz did to get on their bad side?' Steven thought.

As he pondered about this, the unconscious gem that was lying on the hammock suddenly began to stir before opening his eyes, before he realized where he was and got up quickly and began to speak with a sense of urgency.

"Where's Emerald?! Is he okay?! Did he come through with me?! What about the others?!" Topaz frantically demanded.

The gems, as well as Steven, were taken aback by Topaz waking up out of the blue and speaking very quickly that it took a second for everyone to process what was going on. Topaz's sudden waking in his hammock caused it to turn over, sending him crashing to the floor face first.

"Hang on, I gotcha!" said Steven, as he immediately rushed towards Topaz and helped him up to a sitting position.

"Thanks, kid." Topaz thanked Steven, before he got a quick glimpse on what appeared to be a gem embedded on the boy's stomach, much to his surprise. "Kid, where did you get that gem?" Topaz asked as Steven looked at the gem's yellow eyes.

Before Steven could answer Topaz's question, Pearl suddenly responded first, but in less than calm manner, prompting Topaz to turn his attention to her.

"First of all, this is Steven and second, he got that gem from his mother, Rose! Does that answer your question?!" Steven was in shock as he rarely ever saw Pearl lose her cool this quickly.

Likewise, Topaz was just as shocked, his eyes widen in surprise, never expecting that the kid in front of him was Rose Quartz's boy.

While Topaz tried to process the information, Pearl, meanwhile, continued to look at Topaz with disdain, wanting him to stay from Steven as far away as she could take him. But still, Pearl decided to restrain herself for the moment, before she turned to the young boy.

"Steven, we should talk somewhere more private," Pearl informed him, as she escort the boy out of the temple.

"Agreed," Garnet simply said, before she, along with Amethyst, followed Pearl, leaving Topaz alone. Topaz sighed as a smirk came to his face.

"Good to be home again…" Topaz's tone sounded far from happy though. Topaz then took a look around his room. "It's dusty in here... Achoo!"

After the Crystal Gems finished escorted Steven back to his room and making sure that the door behind remained shut for the evening, Steven immediately turned to face them, with a serious look on his face as he spoke.

"What's gotten into you guys?! Why are you treating Topaz like he's some criminal?! He's a Crystal Gem just like you!"

The trio didn't respond to Steven's question right away, uncertain how to answer his question. Eventually, after a long silence, Pearl was the first to respond.

"Steven, there are some things that you're too young to understand,"

"Plus, the past isn't exactly easy to talk about," Amethyst added.

"Some things are best left untold," Garnet simply concluded.

"I don't care what Topaz did in the past! Whatever he did wrong, he deserves another chance!" Steven insisted, which hit a strong nerve in Pearl.

"If we said we don't want to talk about, we won't talk about! Can't you understand that?!" Almost immediately, Pearl realized what she had done, as she saw the hurtful expression from Steven, upset that she just snapped at him. "I… I'm sorry, Steven…" Pearl said remorsefully.

For a while, there was a long, dead silence in the room, as neither Steven nor the Crystal Gems said another word to each other, before the former spoke after what felt like a long time.

"Can I at least talk to Topaz?"

"No can do, Stevie," Amethyst replied.

"But why?" Steven asked perplexed.

"We'll need to get some answers out of him once he's healed up," Pearl informed him. "Then he has to leave,"

"What?!" Steven was shock to hear that last part. "But where will he go?!"

"I don't know and I don't care," Pearl darkly stated. "Just as long as he stays far away from the temple!"

"But-" was all Steven could say, before Garnet raised her arm and spoke up.

"That's the end of this discussion," Garnet told him, before she and her teammates turned and went back inside the temple, leaving Steven in his room all alone.

"What do I do now?" Steven asked himself. "I need to help Topaz out before it's too late," He paced himself back and forth, pondering on what to do, until an idea came to him.

"Of course! I need to get inside, get Topaz, and take him somewhere safe!" Steven declared, before something else came to mind as he stared at the door. "Now… how do I do that?"

The next day…

Steven sat down on the couch, watching TV, as he ate some chips and at the same time, trying to figure out on helping Topaz out, waiting for any opportunity. The rest of the gems were walking into the house, fresh off of business on the other side of the world. Just then, the show he was watching was suddenly replaced by the news.

"We interrupt this program for a special bulletin! There appears to be some sort of twenty foot tall red dog...man...monster rampaging Beach City! Citizens are told to evacuate from the area until further notice!" The footage then cut to the beast picking up a car with one hand and chucking it like it was nothing. The beast was all blood red as it had a head of a dog on a human-like body with strange tubes running up and down it.

The moment the announcer said those words, the gems, as well as Steven, are alarmed to hear this, especially for the former, since they had just gotten back from taking care of another matter.

"You got to be kidding me!" Amethyst complained. "We just got back!"

"This is no time to complain, Amethyst!" Pearl scolded her friend. "We need to get to Beach City and stopped that monster before it's too late!" Pearl then turned to Steven. "Steven, you are to stay here; am I understood?"

"Sure Pearl," Steven replied. "In fact, I don't feel like going out today," Pearl was stunned. Steven; the adventure child of Beach City, didn't feel like going to save the day. Pearl knew he was up to something.

"Pearl! We need to go!" Garnet shouted from the doorway before Pearl could ask Steven about what he was planning. Reluctantly, Pearl follow her friends outside, leaving Steven on his own.

"Alright, it's time to get Topaz out!" Steven declared as he smile widely.

Five minutes later…

Steven was becoming impatient, as he made another futile attempt to open the door, which was now covered in grease, had various broken crowbars stuck in it, and had a few jackhammer dents.

"Ugh! If only my gem worked!" Steven shouted in frustration as he pulled up his shirt and stared at the lifeless gem. Steven then turned to look back at the door, frustrated that it remained tight shut. "Why won't you open?!"

As if to answer his question, the star on door began to spin around, showing off five different color gems, none that Steven recognized, before it unexpectedly opened by itself, revealing Topaz in front of the shocked boy, as he slowly limped his way out of the temple.

"Morning, Steve," Topaz said kindly as if they had been friends for years. He then saw the mess around the door. "Whoa… What happened here?"

"That's not important!" Steven quickly replied. "Right now, I need to take you somewhere else before the Gems get back!"

"Speaking of which, where are they?" Topaz asked out of curiosity.

"They went off to Beach City to take care of some giant dog monster." Steven explained, causing Topaz's eyes to widen in curiosity.

"Can you tell me what the monster looked like?" Topaz said in a serious tone as he got down to one knee to look the boy in the eyes. Steven was a bit perplexed but didn't see anything wrong with telling him about the monster.

"It was red… had a dog's head with a really ripped guy's body… was really tall…" Steven said as he tried to remember all the details about the monster. "Oh and it had these weird glowing tubes going up and down its body!"

"Oh no..." Topaz muttered, horrified to hear this. "Steven, I need you to take me there right now before it's too late! It's a matter of life and death!"

Steven was a bit taken aback the moment Topaz spoke to him like that, but hearing the tone of Topaz voice, in addition to the expression on his face, was enough to convince the boy that he knows what he's talking about.

"O-Okay, Topaz, I'll take you there right now!" Steven agreed, before he, alongside Topaz made their way to the door before Steven gave Topaz a stick to use as a crutch. The two then left through the door of the beach house and making their way to Beach City.

Fighting this giant dog monster proved to be anything but simple; in fact, they barely made a scratch on him since they arrived to defuse the situation. Garnet's punches seemed inefficient, Amethyst whip caused a few scratches but nothing useful, and Pearl's spear was the only one that seemed to cause any damage as she did manage to stab him with it though the wound wasn't very deep. No matter how much they tried, the giant dog monster was more amused than in agony.

"What's the big deal?! We should have taken him down by now!" said an irate Amethyst.

"He's not like any monster we've fought," Garnet commented.

"We can still take him down!" Pearl insisted. "We just need to come up with a plan,"

"Then you better come up with one, because he's heading straight towards us." Amethyst quickly informed her teammate, as the giant dog monster was running head on towards them. The three quickly got out of the way as the monster just kept on running until him ran straight through a brick wall and came out like it was nothing.

"Is this the best you three got?" the giant dog monster mockingly asked. "I was expecting a lot more from the Crystal Gems!"

"Oh great, I was hoping he was another one of those mindless idiots we get so often," Amethyst complained.

"Now's not the time, Amethyst!" Pearl reminded her friend.

"We have to stop him right here and right now!" Garnet ordered.

Agreeing with each other, the Crystal Gems rushed towards the giant dog monster, armed with their chosen weapons. But the giant dog monster, however, anticipated their actions and met them head on, launching a wave of fists, pummeling them down one by one, before all three were laying on the ground, barely conscious and too injured to move.

"Any last words before you three meet your demise?" the giant dog monster asked.

"Hey Fido!" a voice called out, before whistling from behind, prompting the monster to turn around and saw Steven and Topaz, the latter using a stick as some sort of crutch. "Come here, Fido! I've got a treat for you!" The monster, however, let out a laugh upon seeing them.

"What're you going to do? Three Crystal Gems couldn't take me down and they weren't in bandages AND a crutch! And what's tubby gonna do? Eat me?" Topaz smirked as he handed Steven the stick before putting his hands to his gems. Pearl and the others looked on, perplexed at what Topaz was doing.

"I wouldn't trust your eyes if I were you. They'll only tell you lies..." Topaz said calmly with his eyes closed.

With that, Topaz's gems began to activate, before he pulled two heavily curved shorts swords out. The blades were orange with a pink line running up the middle of each blade. The handles were blue with purple straps around them. Topaz combined both his swords together at their grips, merging them into a bow before he spun it around with his left hand, finishing with a yellow bow string appearing to complete the weapon.

"Aw, isn't that cute! You made a wittle bow! You think your puny arrows are gonna hurt me?!" the beast laughed at Topaz which caused the gem to start to laugh as well, confusing his fellow gems

"Of course I don't think that!" the monster stopped laughing before looking at Topaz perplexed. "But then again… that was never my intention to begin with!" Topaz got serious as he grabbed the handles of the two swords and spun them till they faced in opposite directions before spinning around in his right hand, turning the bow into a buzz saw. "I said I had a treat for you, Fido… Well HERE YOU GO!" Topaz shouted as he chucked the spinning saw blades at the creature.

"You think that will stop me?!" the monster shouted in defiance as he attempted to grabbed the blades with his bare hands. He managed to stop the blades… for about half a second. "AHHHH!" the beast shouted as he was ripped clean in half before turning to dust.

As the weapon is flown right back towards Topaz, Steven remained speechless, amazed that someone like Topaz took down a giant monster in a matter of seconds. Eventually, though, the young boy began to finally speak up.

"That was the most amazing thing I have ever seen! You took down that monster like it was no problem!" Steven shouted with excitement, before Topaz suddenly fell down onto his knee, in pain. "Topaz, are you alright?!"

"I-I'm fine, though the same can't be said for my leg," Topaz replied, assuring Steven with a smile.

"Steven, are you alright?!" Steven turned around and saw Garnet, Amethyst and Pearl making their way towards him, despite the injuries they sustained minutes ago.

"I'm fine, thanks to Topaz," Steven assured the gems, before the three turned their attentions towards him.

"Thanks for the help," Garnet thanked Topaz.

"Yeah, I guess we owe you big." Amethyst stated.

"But this doesn't change anything!" Pearl added. "How could you put Steven in danger by bringing him here?!" Pearl demanded an answer.

"Oh, c'mon Pearl! He just saved your life!" Steven berated Pearl, upset by her lack of gratitude.

"Steven… stop," Topaz said calmly. Steven was surprised as the guy he was defending was telling him to stop. "No matter what you say to her, it's not going to change her mind," Steven could look down on the ground, before Topaz spoke again. "But thanks for the help anyway. I appreciate it," Topaz said lightly with a reassuring smile that made Steven feel better.

Pearl, meanwhile, continued to stare at Topaz with disgust, before turning to her teammates.

"Let's get back home right now. The sooner the better," With that, the gems turned and walked to the opposite direction, before something else came to mind. "Why did he have to come back?" she quietly said to herself.

"Come, Steven," Garnet said simply but none of them checked to make sure he did… or they could have done it intentionally.

"Steven, can you hand me the stick?" asked Topaz, prompting the boy to pick it up and handed it to him, before Topaz used the stick to regain his composure. "Thanks."

"Anytime Topaz," said Steven, before he remembered something. "Is it alright if I take you somewhere safe? You still don't appear to be welcomed at the Crystal Temple."

"What do you have in mind?" Topaz asked out of curiosity, causing Steven to hesitate for a moment, before he took a deep breath and offer his answer to him.

"It's not much, but there is one place…"

I hope you all enjoyed my first chapter and my OC Topaz!

It's probably nothing impressive to anyone but please do tell me how I did if you could! I won't get better at writing if I don't know what I'm doing right and wrong.

Till whenever I update again, Sal out!