Universal Assault

Prologue
Thousands of years ago, before the dawn of humanity, the Gems were once a proud race of celestial and magical beings, born with amazing abilities that give their race amazing powers and abilities, and all share the trait of having a magic crystal embedded somewhere on their bodies, the source of their powers that give them the ability to summon special weapons, along with channeling their strength to power whatever unique abilities each Gem is born with.

The galaxy is vast and expansive, several worlds belonged to the Gems and further increased their influence and power, with nothing in the galaxy able to defeat such a mighty alien race, the Gems prospered and had a golden age that lasted for eons, with seemingly no end to their prosperity.

But great power can easily corrupt those who wield it.

As time went on, the inner politics of the Gems slowly formed a massive rift, several Gems found out horrible secrets of their kind stripping entire resources and exterminating life on entire worlds for the sake of their empire, having no regard for any living thing while moving on to repeat the same process, causing civil disputes that only increased the separation of the Gem race.

Things only got worse when Gems seeking to protect life filled worlds decided to rebel against their kind and defend the same worlds to preserve, only to be met with the same fate of extinction while their government covered up the incidents and regarding them as mere accidents.

Then, out of seemingly nowhere since the Gems were too distracted by their own civil politics… THEY came.

THEY were an alien race just like the Gems, THEY were also an expansive empire with great power, their influence just expanding to Gem controlled worlds who made first contact with the new aliens, seeking to have peaceful relations with a fellow empire and establish a treaty of friendship.

THEY refused. THEY didn’t even respond before invading several Gem worlds, managing to wipe out all resistance and strip all resources off of Gem worlds, both organic and inorganic, eerily similar to how the Gems would strip worlds of all resources as well, but in a more brutal and efficient fashion, showing no mercy to those who begged and turned entire planets into bare wastelands in a manner of moments.

A great war began after that, THEY and the Gems fought for years, suffering great casualties in both sides of the war, but THEY pressed onward, no matter how many THEY seemed to lose, THEY still kept going, driven by their power and greed to exterminate the Gems, deeming them inferior beings that deserved nothing but death.

The Gems began to lose the war, underestimating their unexpected foe’s power and vast armies THEY had, THEY had more technological innovation than the Gems all those years ago, wielding powerful technology that the Gems either had no idea how to create or refused to create, THEY had much larger numbers than the Gems, armies and armadas that outnumbered the Gems ten to one, and along with the political strife that still continued to separate the Gems, even after THEY were gaining the upper hand.

The Gems were on the verge of true extinction at one point, most of their worlds were either wastelands or still under siege, cut off from all support as the majority of the Gems were trapped on their Home world, preparing their defenses for what could have possibly been their final battle. The Gems were not usually afraid of things, but for the first time in their history, they were truly scared of not just their extinction, but of THEM as well.

The siege of the Gem Home world was long and bloody, it started like any ordinary invasion that THEY would do. THEY would send in scouts and spies, scoping out the planet to know its strength of its defenses and any potential weakness it had. It made the Gems paranoid and worried, as they waited for days, weeks, even months for the siege to begin. But it felt like centuries for the Gems, anticipating a massive force to come crashing down yet it never came, inducing a form of psychological torture of expecting something big to happen but never does.

And when they least expected it, THEY came down with force.

A massive invasion took place on the Gem home world, THEY were throwing everything they had at the Gems, who were already weakened and split apart by several negative factors, giving THEY the chance to wipe the Gems off of the face of the universe. When all seemed lost for the Gems, a miracle happened, a miracle under the name of a special Gem

Rose Quartz

Rose, although being a Gem who opposed her kind from stripping all life from worlds, managed to briefly unite all Gems under her authority for a common goal, survival. The Gems, now united once more, fought back their invaders with everything they had as well, catching their numerous foes by surprise with their renewed faith and hope, pushing back the alien siege to the point of wiping out almost every single invader on the Gem home world, forcing THEY to retreat and dealt a massive blow to the invaders, severely weakening their military strength in the galaxy since a large majority of their forces invaded the Gem home world.

Victory came at a cost however, Rose Quartz had shed several tears after the battle ended, and struck by the loss of several brave Gems who died in battle or were killed in cold blood. Rose managed to push onwards however, leading the surviving Gems on the Home World to take the fight back to them, going to world after world to save other Gems still under siege and increase the Gem’s hope and strength, slowly bringing her race back from near extinction and push back their superior foe.

In one last battle against THEY, the Gems defeated whatever was left of the invaders, decimating their moral and power completely after striking a killing blow, eliminating their leader who commanded the entire force, a supreme commander who went by the name of Xeres the Eliminator.

Rose led a final assault on the invader’s mothership, bringing along her closest friends Pearl, Garnet, and a few others to infiltrate and destroy the remaining leadership that the invaders had. When Rose and her Gem companions finally confronted the commander, after countless battles against the crew of course, Rose tried to negotiate with Xeres, wanting this war to end peacefully and halt further bloodshed on both sides.

With all forms of negotiation failing to break Xeres, Rose asked the cruel commander with all her heart, why was he still continuing this war, even after all that has happened, after all the death and chaos that had ensued, after all of the loss in both sides, she wanted to know why Xeres still continued it.

Xeres just laughed at Rose’s question and gave an answer that the Gems would always remember.

“Because your kind is weak and insignificant. You Gems are nothing more than mere specks of the entire universe, desperately trying to cling onto your old beliefs while constantly contradicting yourselves in hypocrisy and lies. Gems are but pests to our glorious empire, deserving nothing more than death to us, a superior species with every right to exterminate weaklings such as your kind. And I swear to you that although we will lose this war and my life, we will come back and finish what we have started here, no matter how long it takes, we will exterminate your kind and purify this galaxy! We will return!”

Those were the last words of Xeres before he activated a self-destruct sequence on his ship, rather wanting to kill himself than to be taken in alive and face his actions that he felt justified doing. The Gems managed to escape alive before the mothership blew up, and the remaining invaders fled from the Gems, retreating back from wherever THEY came from and were never seen again.

Xeres’s words meant a lot to the Gems, for while there was much hate and wrong to them, there was also a bit of truth as well, which further shaped the Gem’s views on their way of life, some believing that Xeres had a point while others believed he was a liar. Either way, the Gems still took his words by heart, and those words would help shape the inevitable future to come.

After the defeat of the aliens, the Gems returned to their worlds to help rebuild their once vast empire, but quickly returned to their old ways once more, fighting amongst each other for the preservation or extermination of life in the galaxy, culminating into the events that created the eventual split of the Gems, the Home World Gems who sought out further expansion through force, and the Crystal Gems, guardians of their new found home on Earth and defenders of its inhabitants, humanity.

In these days, the Crystal Gems are but a very few amount, for only Pearl, Garnet, and Amethyst survived the war while the other Crystal Gems had perished, including Rose, while the Home world Gems had left Earth alone, seeking to conquer other worlds and ignore Earth for now, until recent events involving Home world Gems arriving to Earth to discover the Crystal Gems were still alive and well, and were still opposing their rule despite their few numbers.

It didn’t matter to the Crystal Gems however, for they would still be dedicated to being the guardians of their home and of humanity, and no matter what threat comes in their way, they would be there to protect their home.

But still, the lingering memories of THEY lingered in Pearl and Garnet’s minds, Amethyst was only told stories about THEY since she was not born during that ancient war, but it scared her to think about THEY just from the stories she was told, and Steven Universe who is the newest Crystal Gem and Rose’s son, was never told of THEY since he was not old enough to understand such creatures.

Garnet wouldn’t dwell too much on such creatures as THEY and Xeres for long, but Pearl was always someone who liked to remember the good things about the past. But good things would also remind Pearl of bad things as well, Xeres and THEY being part of it.

It always worried the Gem too, since every night while no one is looking, Pearl would sneak away from the other Gems to stare up in the stars in deep thought in worry and fright, still remembering the words Xeres said all those years ago.

“We will return!”

Those last three words ringed in her head all the time, because of the way Xeres said them, not with malice and venom, but with brutal sincerity. She knew that he meant every single word from his vengeful vow, and would always think about THEY ever since, and would stare up in those skies in fear of anticipation of their old foe, their name that the Gems only referred to as THEY or THEM, but they knew what their cursed name was, a name that THEY constantly reminded the Gems that Pearl only said in her mind.

“The Hierarchy.”

Chapter 1
It was just another ordinary day at Beach city for Steven and the Crystal Gems. The sun shined brightly on the coastal town, signaling another peaceful day for its inhabitants despite what happened with the Home world Gem incident. No monsters were attacking anything, no sign of Peridot ever since her pod was found, not a single thing was wrong today.

It made Steven bored out of his mind.

The young Gem wanted to do something epic and adventurous with his Gem friends, expecting something to happen today because of how quiet it was. He would have hanged out with Connie today, but she said that she had to visit her grandmother with her parents today. Everything else in Beach city was normal too, no one had any problems that needed to be taken care of, nor did the Gems have any issues themselves.

All Steven did was sit lazily around the couch, groaning for something to happen already.

“Ughhhh!” Groaned the child, laying down on the couch out of boredom and constantly switching positions.

“Hey Steven!”

Steven got up to hear the voice behind him, seeing that it was Amethyst holding a bag of chips, who could hear Steven’s loud groans from afar and walked up to the child.

“Trying to find a good spot to do nothing?” Asked the purple skinned Gem.

Steven just groaned in response.

“Well, if you can’t find the right spot-

Amethyst then leaped onto the couch, shapeshifting into a purple hippo and landing on the couch, making Steven roll off quickly before getting mushed under Amethyst’s sudden weight gain.

“Just take ALL the spots.”

Amethyst and Steven both laughed, getting a chuckle out of the purple Gem’s antics as the bag of chips she carried dropped on her head, spilling many of the salty snacks on the couch and floor.

“Amethyst!” Shouted a voice across the kitchen, that voice being an annoyed Pearl who saw Amethyst cause the chip mess, walking to the living right after she finished washing the dishes.

“I just cleaned the furniture an hour ago!” Exclaimed Pearl, frustrated that she had to clean all over again.

“Oh well. I guess you have to start over.” Replied Amethyst, waving off Pearl’s concerns as she shifted back into her regular form, dumping whatever was left of the chips in the bag in her mouth.

“How can you be so inconsiderate?” Asked Pearl, fuming over Amethyst’s usual behavior again.

“Well, excuse me Princess.” Mocked Amethyst, having nothing better to do than make Pearl mad.

Steven then stepped in between the arguing Gems, not wanting them to fight over something so dumb.

“Don’t fight, guys.” Interrupted Steven. “I know there’s nothing to do today, but you shouldn’t fight over something like this.”

Steven then grabbed a chip in each hand and faced them to the two Gems, Amethyst looked at the chip confusingly while Pearl shuddered at the fact food was in front of her.

“Have some chips to protect your friendship. Friendchips!”

Amethyst raised her eyebrow at the gesture. “Friendchips?”

Steven nodded happily. “Yup. Chips that show that you’re still friends.”

“Steven.” Said Pearl to the child in her more calm motherly voice. “I know you want to be nice, but food is just too revolting to even mean anything good.”

Pearl then turned to Amethyst to give her a mean glare, who just ignored the glare and snatched the two chips away from Steven.

“Oh well. More for me.” Shrugged Amethyst, eating the two “Friendchips”, making Pearl twitch her eye at the sight.

Suddenly, Garnet entered the room, looking as serious as she usually is.

“Gems. We have a mission to do.”

This news got everyone interested, especially Steven, who practically jumped for joy at the news.

“Yes! I don’t have to stay home all day!” Exclaimed Steven happily.

Garnet signaled the Gems to follow her, walking the group to the warp pad to prepare for the new mission.

“So Garnet. Where are we going now? An ancient temple? A cloud city? A Bubble world?” Asked Steven excitingly, eager to know where the Gems were going now.

Garnet stayed unusually silent to Steven’s questions before responding vaguely.

“Somewhere.”

This caught not just Steven, but even Amethyst and Pearl off guard to the vague answer.

“Somewhere? Where exactly?” Asked Pearl, expecting Garnet to respond to her.

Garnet still stayed silent, making Pearl uncomfortable and unsure as to why Garnet was acting like this. Sometimes Garnet would act like the strong silent type when necessary, but not to a simple question like this.

“Oh boy! It’s a mystery.” Said Steven, just happy to come along with the Gems on a mission that was mysterious.

The warp pad then activated, transporting the Gems to the coordinates to wherever they had to go, disappearing in a bright flash.

O-O-O

It didn’t take long for the Gems to arrive at their destination, arriving in a bright flash and emerging to see an interesting sight.

“Whoa.”

That word was all Steven could say at the sight before the Gems. Right in front of the Gems was a large temple, though it looked to be in ruins now. The stone forming the majestic building is now decayed, most of it now having large holes on the sides like new entrances, the statue that resided on the temple’s top was missing its upper half, which was crumbled behind the temple, whatever beauty the old temple had is now in ruins.

The land around them was unusual as well. It felt like a more alien world, indicating that wherever they transported to is not on Earth, yet it felt strangely familiar to home for Garnet and Pearl. The moon above suggested it was at least midnight here, yet the land was still noticeably barren, nothing but dry and dark rocky landscapes surrounded the Gems, with a cold chill in the air that made their spines shiver from the sudden cold.

“This place is giving me the creeps.” Commented Amethyst, rubbing her arms from the chill she felt.

Pearl turned to Garnet with a worried look.

“Garn-?”

“We’re here to find an artifact.” Interrupted Garnet, making Steven disappointed that the mystery was already spoiled.

“Aww man. I wanted to find that out myself.”

“Pearl and I will go ahead.” Said Garnet in her usual sternness. “Amethyst. You follow close behind with Steven.”

Amethyst gave Garnet a thumbs up, as Garnet ran ahead of the group with Pearl in tow, going up the large stone steps and getting out of earshot from Amethyst and Steven.

“Wanna race up to the top?” Asked Amethyst, with Steven happily agreeing.

O-O-O

“Garnet. Are you okay?” Asked Pearl, concerned about her comrade’s health. “You’re not usually like this.”

“No. I’m not fine.” Answered Garnet bluntly, catching Pearl even more off guard than ever.

“Are we really here for an artifact?”

“There may be one here, but that’s not why.”

Garnet and Pearl reached the top of the temple steps, seeing that the large doors that lead inside the temple were down on the ground, appearing to have large holes and cracks on them. Taking a closer look at the damage on the doors and the temple around them, Pearl noticed several black marks staining the stone, indicating that some kind of weapon was used here.

Pearl thought to herself about the temple, trying to remember what this place was before commenting out loud. “This place feels… familiar.”

“Don’t you remember?” Asked Garnet, still keeping her stern tone despite what as before them.

Pearl did have one thought, but she shook it away from her mind, hoping that it wasn’t what Garnet was suggesting.

“Why are we really here?”

“There was a distress signal I picked up here.”

This answer shocked Pearl, making her step back in surprise. “A distress signal? From a Home world Gem? Why?”

“I don’t know. But we should investigate it, just in case.”

“Just… in case… what?” Panted Steven from behind with Amethyst, the Gem clearly winning the race while just as curious as Steven.

“In case uh… we, if we-

“In case we need someone to watch the entrance for us.” Interrupted Garnet, making up a lie for Steven to stay put. “It would be very important to us if you and Amethyst stayed here to watch out for us.”

“But I want to see what’s inside.” Whined Steven, hoping that Garnet would buy into his act.

“Garnet is right, Steven. Who knows what could be out there?”

Steven looked out at the wasteland beyond, not really too convinced about this. The child looked at Amethyst who shrugged her shoulders at what was up with Garnet and Pearl, eventually agreeing to their demands as they went inside they temple, leaving the pair behind at the entrance to investigate.

“Did we have to leave them there?” Asked Pearl.

“Steven is too young to know about this. And Amethyst can’t keep a secret.” Replied Garnet.

Pearl just stayed silent. She knew that Garnet had a point, but there was no way that anything bad could be found here. She didn’t want to believe that the way Garnet was acting was because this was the work of… THEM.

She didn’t want to believe it.

“The signal came from upstairs. We should move quickly.” Ordered Garnet, spotting a stone staircase leading to all the different floors.

Running inside the temple reminded Pearl how spacious it was, having flashbacks of thousands of years ago when Gems would frequently come to these temples for peace and sanctuary. Now it was in ruins, the stone around was cracked and covered in several large black marks, the several statues inside were also either crumbled to the ground or missing parts of its structure. It was a sad sight to see such a holy place now in ruin.

Unknown to the two Gems however, Amethyst was watching them from afar and waiting until they were gone up, giving the two Gems a suspicious look before smiling gleefully.

“Okay, they’re gone now. Now let’s go have some real fun.” Said Amethyst, walking inside the temple with Steven following, not feeling good about ignoring Pearl and Garnet’s orders.

“Are you sure this is a good idea? Pearl and Garnet wouldn’t tell us to stay put without a good reason.” Said Steven, doubting that what they were doing was a good decision.

Amethyst just responded with a ‘Pfffft.’

“Come on, Steven. There’s no point to having fun if you can’t break any rules.” Said Amethyst casually, running inside the temple.

“What’s the worst that could happen?”

O-O-O

Just a few floors under the top of the temple, a 6 foot figure stood by some kind of high tech computer, pressing several buttons on screen in a stressed out manner, as if it were in a rush for something.

“Come one, come on. Please respond.” Pleaded the figure, hoping that someone would respond.

The figure appeared to be colored in a palate of red and looked female, very similar in design to Peridot but skinnier, having long red hair, and not as modified with technology, wearing some kind of synthetic lightweight armor that had her gem located on her chest, which was in an oval shape.

“Please respond already.” Pleaded the Gem again, not willing to stay here any longer. “I don’t want to-

Out of seemingly nowhere, a burst of green energy bolts hit the computer console, blowing it up in front of the Gem and knocking her back due to the blast.

The Gem got up just in time to see what had caused the damage, which was a shock for her to see.

The Gem saw a group of at least a dozen alien creatures in front of her, appearing to have massive heads, glowing red eyes, and hunched bodies with spindly limbs tipped with three fingers and toes, colored in light grey skin and looked very familiar to the stereotypical “Gray” alien. The only form of armor the aliens wore seemed to be a large collar around their necks with a set of cuffs on their wrists, colored blood red along with their weapons, which were some kind of advanced guns that shot out a very volatile bright green matter, plasma.

The alien creatures began to chitter in high pitch tones, some screeched at the Gem viscously to express their desire to kill while other laughed crazily at her, despite the fact that the creatures had no visible mouths.

“You want to kill me?!” Shouted the Gem at the alien creatures, ready to stand her ground against her seemingly psychotic foes.

“No.” Responded a venomous voice from behind, as the Gem turned around to see a tall and imposing figure standing behind her. “Nufai wants you alive.”

It looked completely different from the other alien creatures, not just its notable height of seven feet, but it’s very sinister appearance as well, it also had a hunched back body and colored with light grey skin, it’s head was much smaller however and had a long neck located below its shoulders, the head of the creature had six glowing yellow eyes along with some kind of tendrils below its oddly shaped head that acted as its mouth, the creatures limbs were also long and spindly, but it had three fingers equipped with some kind of synthetic claws on each digit, and wore a lightweight armor on its torso, both colored in blood red and had two clawed digits on its feet, using them to stand up and walk.

The imposing figure caught the Gem off guard and stared into her eyes, intimidating her and prevented her from summoning whatever weapon she wanted to use, doing so by slashing its claws upward, knocking down the Gem and disorientating her, and grabbed the Gem with his claws to put her down on her knees, making her face the hideous creature as it placed one of its clawed digits on her oval Gem.

“You will tell Nufai what he wants to know.” Addressed the creature in first person, an unusual habit that slightly confused the captured Gem but responded anyways.

“I won’t tell you anything.”

Nufai lowered his eyes, clearly not amused by the Gem’s defiance and knew what he had to do now, which pleased the alien with twisted glee.

“Then Nufai shall make you suffer.”

Chapter 2
“Wow! This place is huge!” Exclaimed Steven, exploring the huge and spacious hallway right by the front entrance, observing the ancient fallen statues and the Gem inscriptions below the stone stands they once stood on.

“Yeah, I guess.” Responded Amethyst, not really as impressed with the architecture as Steven was. “Could use some better decorating.”

“Maybe we could make another home here? It’ll be just like the temple back on Earth, only darker, and kind of cold.” Said Steven, rubbing his arms as he still felt the chill in the air.

“And messy… I love it!” Agreed Amethyst, as her and Steven walked up to some kind of ancient stone doors that seemed to lead into the middle of the temple.

The large doors had several Gem inscriptions that every door here had, but what stood out were the images of two Gems that covered the entire door, appearing to be kneeling down and holding some kind of orb that also had inscriptions on them.

“What’s in here?” Steven asked out loud.

“Probably some more broken Gem stuff.” Shrugged off Amethyst. “Just like everything else in here.”

“Maybe. Maybe not.”

Steven then tried to push the doors open, using all of his strength that the boy could muster.

“Come on… open… sesame.”

The child then gave up, seeing that the doors wouldn’t even budge and fell flat on the ground, exhausted and panting from the struggle to open the door.

“You really want to get inside there, don’t you?” Asked Amethyst, as Steven nodded in reply, making the purple Gem chuckle. “I got this.”

Amethyst, using her shapeshifting powers, turned into a bull and picked up Steven, riding on Amethyst’s back as she charged right into the stone doors, specifically into a crack on the door that was a possible weak spot.

“Amethyst!?”

“I got this, Steven!” Assured Amethyst, knowing exactly what she was doing.

The purple Gem managed to get through easily, charging right through the door and creating a new hole that she perfectly got out of, while Steven activated his shield out of the worry of getting hit in the face by a rock.

Amethyst then stopped dead in her place, making Steven fall off as she immediately shape shifted back into her original form, though Steven got up without any harm.

“That was so awesome!” Exclaimed Steven, amazed at Amethyst’s bull charge through a door.

Amethyst did not respond however, making Steven look at her to see an expression of pure shock on her face, noticing her eyes were wide open as if she was staring at something horrifying.

“Amethyst? What’s wrong?” Asked Steven, now getting worried about his purple Gem friend.

Amethyst responded back in an uncharacteristic manner. “We uh… Maybe we should go back now.”

“Why?”

Steven then looked in front of Amethyst and saw what she was staring at, making the young child shocked, confused, and horrified at what was in front of him.

What he saw in front of him was a large temple room, surrounded by ancient stone with a mostly destroyed Statue in the center, surrounded by a large fountain now dry of water, and behind that statue was a large gaping opening of what used to be a wall, now revealing the outside of the dark wastelands beyond. But decaying stone and fallen statues were not what shocked the two Crystal Gems, not even the black stains all around that indicated the usage of alien weaponry.

It was the bodies that shocked them.

Several skeletons of deceased alien creatures laid across the temple floor, all but dry bones and wore rusted blood red armor, their weapons broken and their fragments scattered, accompanying the smaller skeletons are even larger skeletons with more rusted blood red armor across the floor.

Perhaps the most shocking part of the remains of these aliens were the two large remains of some kind of four legged walkers, their round disc form of a saucer and their crippled legs were all that was left of these alien war machines, now nothing but ruins and part of this room.

An old battlefield.

“A-amethyst. What happened here?” Stuttered Steven, scared out of his mind about what he was seeing.

“Oh man… We should have told you.” Answered Amethyst, letting that slip out of her tongue.

“You know about this?” Asked Steven frightfully, close to the verge of tears about what he was seeing.

“No! Not this! Something like that, like THEM.” Pointed Amethyst to the alien skeletons.

Steven was still scared and confused. “Them? What are they?”

Amethyst regretted opening her mouth for once, not sure what to say about what she saw since she was just as shocked as Steven.

“Let’s just go find Pearl and Garnet. You need to know now.”

Amethyst lead Steven out of the room as quickly as they went in, feeling guilty about showing Steven such a horrible sight.

Amethyst never had the fate of meeting THEM, or really the Hierarchy as they were actually called, she was born after the whole Gem/Hierarchy war that was waged in the galaxy, but Pearl and Garnet told her stories of these aliens since they were there first hand, and she was horrified by those stories.

Hearing those stories from Garnet talking about how powerful and advanced the Hierarchy were sent shivers down her spine, and hearing Pearl talk about the more emotional side of the conflict, the Gems that died, the worlds that were destroyed, the suffering they caused, there was even a point when Pearl began crying about how many close friends she knew died, it made Amethyst feel so much sympathy for the Gem.

Now that Steven saw something like this, a bloodied old battlefield of death and destruction, she had to get Pearl and Garnet to tell him the truth, there was no other way at this point. She still had some kind of hope inside her though, the hope that these stories would just be forgotten and become fairytales, the hope that the Hierarchy would never return.

But hope does not always mean truth.

O-O-O

“There’s still one thing I don’t understand. How did we get off world if we destroyed the galaxy warp?” Asked Pearl, while she and Garnet ran up a spiral staircase.

“Not all warp pads leading off world were at the galaxy warp.” Answered Garnet. “The Home world must have made a few models and never told anyone.”

“We would have been on the pad though.”

“Then someone was tampering with it.”

That answer filled Pearl with more worry than relief, but she stopped asking questions for now, since Garnet was not in the mood right now, and they had a mission to do, a mission to do fast before things get complicated.

Garnet and Pearl were close to the top of the temple, nearby to where the distress signal came from as they ran up the spiral stone staircase, careful not to fall due to how fragile the stone was after years of damage and decay. The walls that used to surround the staircase were now decayed or gone, some had huge holes that revealed the outside world of the dead wastelands.

Pearl couldn’t help herself but stare out at them once in a while to see if anything was there, but to also lament about how sad this was. She understood that she had a mission to do, especially if it involved a Home world Gem on the loose, but she couldn’t help herself but think back to more flashbacks of her past life, the happier parts before seeing the truth of the Home world’s actions.

Glancing outside at the wasteland once more, she saw something peculiar in the distance and stopped, knowing that whatever was out there was not supposed to be here.

“Garnet!” Shouted Pearl out to the Gem leader, who stopped to see what Pearl was seeing.

Pearl pointed outside to the wasteland through one of the many huge holes in the wall, with Garnet having a shocked expression on her face, at least as shocked as Garnet could look.

In the distance of the wasteland was some kind of large saucer shaped object, colored blood red and had a large ring around and a smaller ring in the middle, created a spacious gap between the two ring like structures, the object’s top had three long structures that expanded on the top of the ship, all connected to the center of the object that had some kind of circular object at the bottom of its center that the Gems could not see, but the sight alone gave the two Gems much fear and paranoia.

They knew what kind of ship that was.

“It can’t be.” Said Pearl softly with shocking realization, now stuttering out her words from fear. “I-it can’t be t-t-them. No, no, no, no. T-there’s no way it c-could possibly be… THEM.”

“It is.” Responded Garnet in her usual stern voice, but even that had a sense of fear that could be felt. “That is one of their transport ships. Which means they could be in here right now.”

Pearl then started to hyperventilate, feeling light headed in the process and almost fell down until Garnet caught her, as Pearl began thinking back to the horrible memories of her ancient foes.

The massive armies that swarmed the Gems, their plasma weaponry that rained down from the skies and across the battlefield, the carnage of closing in their forces and being covered in their blood and guts, the Gems that were shattered, so many Gems shattered.

“Pearl! Snap out of it!”

The visually horrified Gem snapped out of her dark thoughts to hear Garnet speaking to her.

“Pearl. Look at me.” Ordered Garnet, making the scared Gem look at her leader. “Stay calm. I know you have bad memories about… THEM, but I need you focused. We go up to find the Home world Gem, take care of her, and go back home like this never happened. Okay?”

Pearl felt calmer now, standing herself up and shook away the bad memories about THEM, not even daring to think about their true name since THEY were here now, as Garnet patted her on the back to comfort her.

“AHHHHHHHHHHHH!”

Loud screams could be heard from above, screams of great pain and fear that echoed in the supposedly abandoned temple, causing even more concern with the two Gems.

“We need to get there, now!” Ordered Garnet, as she and Pearl ran up the stairs as fast as possible, getting closer and closer to the screams that continued to echo downward.

The Gems managed to get up to the right floor, where they heard another scream come from behind two large stone doors that had yet to be crushed, but were open far enough for the Gems to peek out of and squeeze through. The two Gems took out their special weapons just in case, Pearl readied her spear and Garnet took out her gauntlets, able to fight back against the possibility that their old foes have returned.

Instead of blindly charging into the fight, Garnet ordered her and Pearl to hide behind the doors to peek inside, not wanting to underestimate her old foes as she did years ago. Those were painful experiences she did not want to relive.

What the Gems saw was a sight that unfortunately confirmed their greatest fears, as they clearly saw a group of a dozen alien creatures wielding plasm weaponry, one of the few weapons that could severely damage a Gem, even in their physical forms, seeing firsthand the same creatures that caused so much death and chaos to their race all those years ago, all in some kind of room with a destroyed computer and a warp pad close behind them.

“Lost Ones.” Whispered Pearl, having horrible memories about these twisted creatures. “I remember how psychotic and twisted they are, horrible creatures.”

These “Lost Ones” as Pearl called them, were surrounding a much larger and sinister figure around them, who appeared to be grasping tightly onto a Home World Gem with one hand on her torso to prevent her from escaping, while the other free hand was used to place one of its clawed digits on her oval Gem, which looked to be cracked as the Gem grunted in pain from contact.

“What is that creature?” Whispered Pearl, confused at what the hideous beast was. “I’ve never seen something like that before. THEY wouldn’t make alliances with other races.”

Garnet stayed silent, wanting to listen in to what the creature was saying, shocking Pearl more that the creature was actually speaking their language.

“Once again, tell Nufai your name.” Demanded Nufai in his venomous voice.

“I-

Nufai then proceeded to force his clawed digit into the oval Gem, pushing it ever so slightly with enough force to actually make a Gem feel pain, making her scream out in agony that Nufai took great pleasure in hearing, while the spying Gems felt more disgust for Nufai and even had some pity for the Home world Gem being tortured, not even they deserved to suffer from THEM.

“Nufai is asking you simple questions, woman! Do you not care for your own life?”

The Gem barely spoke back from the pain. “I… I do.”

“Then you will tell Nufai what your name is, or suffer more pain and give me great pleasure.”

The Home world Gem did not have much time to think, seeing Nufai’s claw pressed against her oval Gem forced her to blurt out her name to the twisted creature.

“RED CORAL!” Shouted out the Home world Gem. “My name is Red Coral!”

Nufai chuckled lowly with sadistic glee.

“Better. Now what is your purpose here?”

The Gem began to answer Nufai’s questions, unable to take any more pain from the twisted creature.

“I’m a scout. I was sent by the Home world to investigate our dead worlds for anything valuable.”

“Home world? So there is more of you alive after all?”

“Yes.” Admitted Red Coral, knowing that she had nothing else left but to give up now. “I was supposed to find any artifacts to help my world, but I’ve found nothing but old wounds and horrible memories of war.”

Nufai eyed the Home world Gem closely, realizing that the Gem was telling nothing but the truth at this point, and Nufai had nothing else important to ask the Gem.

“Please. Let me-

Before the Gem could finish her sentence, Nufai used his entire claw to impale the Gem right through her, piercing her oval Gem that was her life force and finished off the weakened celestial being, shattering her Gem completely into shards and effectively killing her, making the twisted creature laugh in sadistic glee.

“Nufai thanks you for the information, foolish woman.” Said Nufai to the remains of the Gem.

While Pearl and Garnet did not have the most sympathy for the Home world Gems, they couldn’t help themselves but remember how many of their people were killed in cold blood in such actions like that, as they observed Nufai ordering around his Lost Ones, but could not understand the language that Nufai spoke to his troops, since it was in their own language of chitters, screeches, and other twisted sounds.

“Gather the shards for our scientists. They’ll like new Gem shards instead of the old ones we found at the bottom.” Ordered Nufai in his own language, as a Lost One gathered all the shards of Red Coral and placed them in a special metallic cylinder canister.

There was something off about this Nufai that the Gems sensed. They knew that THEY were not the nicest race aliens in the galaxy, but there was something about Nufai in particular that felt… off. He was obviously sick in the head for taking so much pleasure in Red Coral’s pain, but the Gems felt that there was something more to this twisted creature than his horrid appearance and actions, like there was some kind of dark and twisted mystery to what exactly Nufai was that stood out, even for THEM.

As the Lost Ones prepared to leave, Nufai turned his head to briefly see something barely poking out of the large doors across from him in the corner of his eyes. The Gems hiding behind the doors hid behind, hoping that Nufai did not spot them. Before the Gems realized that the deathly silence from across meant they were found, the sinister voice of Nufai echoed across to them.

“I know you are there, intruders.”

Chapter 3
The Gem’s cover was blown, seeing no point in hiding as Garnet punched through the doors, blowing away stone pieces towards Nufai, who used his claws to expertly slice and dice every fragment of stone coming towards him.

Garnet and Pearl leaped out of the entrance towards Nufai, prepared to fight while his Lost Ones armed their plasma weapons and aimed right at the Gems, eager to kill the Gems for their amusement as Nufai spoke to the Gems in their language.

“More Gems, but not with this Red Coral that once was.” Said Nufai, eyeing the Crystal Gems with brief curiosity. “Interesting.”

Pearl pointed her spear straight at Nufai. “Give up you horrible monster, or the Crystal Gems will end you.”

Nufai was somewhat interested at that response. “Crystal Gems? There’s a new sub species of your wretched kind? Very interesting.”

“We are the Guardians of all life in this galaxy, and we will not let you run free to take anymore!” Exclaimed Pearl to Nufai, noticing that a Lost One took aim and fired at the Gem too early.

The alien’s eagerness to kill would backfire on him however, since Pearl gracefully dodged the plasma fire and fired back a blast of her own from her spear, the blast hitting the lost One’s plasma gun inside from where it fired, causing a small explosion and fragmented the weapon, along with knocking back the alien away.

Nufai chittered to a Lost One to contact the transport ship to come towards the temple, knowing that both Gems fighting against his forces would win, but he had another idea in mind as he began to taunt the Gems.

“You two would make great torture things to play with.” Nufai then let out a disappointed sigh, which sent shivers down the Gem’s spines, the way the hideous creature spoke and the venomous voice he has just made the Gems uncomfortable.

“A shame Nufai has no time for you however. So you shall have quick deaths!”

The twisted creature chittered out to his Lost Ones, ordering them to open fire on the Gems and stood back to let his troops charge in, taking the shards from one of his Lost Ones and ran off, letting his troops take care of the Gems for him.

The Lost Ones fired bursts of plasma fire at Pearl and Garnet, laughing manically at the opportunity to slaughter more Gems, as the two Gems took cover behind a fallen statue close by them, while the Lost Ones inched closer and closer to their cover and slowly broke it apart from their plasma fire.

“Pearl! Go after Nufai! We can’t let any of them escape.” Ordered Garnet, as Pearl complied and ran after Nufai, gracefully dodging any incoming plasma fire with her ballet fighting style.

Garnet used the same tactic when she first introduced herself, punching the statues as hard as she could and sent the stone pieces flying towards the Lost Ones, knocking down at least three of them while the others continued firing at Garnet and managed to avoid the stones, surprisingly nimble for being only five feet tall and having frail bodies.

The Gem charged right at the Lost Ones, getting up close to an alien and grabbed his plasma weapon from its hands, using it to hit the alien right at its large head like a baseball bat and sent it flying into a stone wall.

The Lost Ones, realizing that their Gem foes was a lot stronger than they thought, decided to use a new tactic against such a powerful force and pressed a yellow circular button on their cuffs, activating some kind of device installed in them.

Garnet was about to punch yet another Lost One right at its cranium when her fist suddenly went right through it, like the alien became some kind of phantom. The Gem turned around to see that the remaining Lost Ones did the same, as she swatted away at their seemingly transparent bodies, only to go through them as they laughed at her feeble attempts to hit them.

While a few lost Ones used this tactic to distract Garnet and get in her way to try and make her attack them, two of the Lost Ones went behind the Gem and pressed the same circular button again to become normal again, and began to shoot her in the back with Plasma fire as point blank range.

Feeling great pain from the back, Garnet quickly switched targets to hit the Lost Ones blasting her, only for them to activate their devices on their cuffs to make themselves transparent again, as the Lost ones she was fighting in front of her repeated the same tactic and shot her in the back once more, disorientating and hurting the leader Gem.

“Phase modules on Lost Ones? That’s new.” Thought Garnet to herself, surprised that the Hierarchy managed to miniaturize such technology and give it to psychopaths like the Lost Ones.

As the Lost Ones laughed manically at Garnet’s attempts to beat them, a Lost One was about to blast her in the back again when suddenly a whip coiled around his gun, pulling him away and flinged him into a wall.

“Dirty fighting huh?” Quipped a voice behind, making the Lost Ones turn to see Amethyst cracking her whip while Steven stood close behind.

“I can play dirty too.”

The Lost Ones screeched in defiance, as the six left standing splinted up into group of three, one group to go up against Garnet while the others went up against Amethyst, making the purple Gem swing her whip to try and get all three knocked down, only for them to activate their phase modules and let the whip pass through them.

“Hey! That’s cheating!” Exclaimed Steven, unhappy that the Lost Ones were using the phase module to avoid Amethyst’s whip.

Deactivating their modules, they began to fire upon the Gems, making Steven panic and activate his bubble shield to protect him and Amethyst from the Plasma blasts, which were surprisingly strong and made Steven struggle to keep the shield active.

While that was going on, Garnet thought of a new strategy to take out the three Lost Ones harassing her with such back stabbing tactics. She slammed her fists into the ground as hard as she could, causing the stone floor to crumble and fall apart, breaking the floor around her small area and made the three Lost Ones surrounding her fall down while she jumped away from the large hole she made safely, as the Lost Ones fell down to the floor under, getting trapped under the rocks before they could activate their phase modules and were buried in the stone.

After Steven’s bubble broke, Amethyst cracked her whip once more at a Lost One firing plasma at her, avoiding the shots and coiled her whip around its frail body and swung him in a circle, knocking him into another Lost One and knocking them out.

The last Lost One charged right at Steven, scaring the living daylights out of the child who did not except such a hideous alien as it cackled in its chittering and took aim at the boy at point blank range, only for the child to activate his smaller round shield and reflect the shots back into the alien’s gun, causing it to explode and knock the alien away towards Garnet, who gave the twisted creature a swift punch to the face and knocked it away to a wall, finishing the fight against the sadistic aliens.

“Wow.” Commented Amethyst, staring at the unconscious Lost Ones all around her. “You used to fight these things?”

“Hush.” Demanded Garnet sternly. “Not in front of Steven.”

Steven just scratched the back of his head nervously while Amethyst let out a nervous chuckle.

“He um… he knows. Kind of.”

Garnet then looked at Amethyst with a glare, or at least it seemed like a glare due to the leader Gem’s shades, making Amethyst hold her hands up in protest.

“Hey, I didn’t say anything to him!” Argued the purple Gem. “He had to find out the hard way.”

“It’s not her fault.” Steven said as he walked up to the Gem. “We… found skeletons. Scary ones down the temple. I wanted to open this door and-

“No Steven.” Interrupted Garnet, going down on one knee and sighed. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you this sooner. I thought we never had to worry about THEM again.”

“THEM?”

Steven was silent for a moment until he asked another question. “Does Pearl know too?”

“Yes. And we’ll tell you about all this when we get back home.” Answered Garnet. “Right now, we need to go to the top of the temple. Pearl must be there still.”

O-O-O

After chasing after the horrid creature, Pearl managed to reach to the spacious temple top, which overlooked the darkened wasteland that surrounded the ancient temple, and saw Nufai standing right across from her with his back turned.

“You!” Exclaimed Pearl to Nufai, pointing her spear at the hideous beast, who turned to face Pearl with an intimidating stare, making Pearl almost step back from his horrid appearance as he chuckled darkly at the sight of her.

“So you are the one who followed me? Good.” Said Nufai, slowly walking towards her while she took a blast at him, causing him to avoid the blast by side stepping in a swift manner.

“Don’t you dare take another step towards me, you monster!” Warned Pearl, as Nufai stood in place and continued to stare with his unblinking eyes.

“You are quite a risk taker. Trying to kill your killer.”

“I won’t be killed by the likes of you.” Spat back the Gem with venom. “I’ve already seen too many die from your kind.”

“Do you mean the Hierarchy or my race? Because my race was wiped out by the Hierarchy years ago.”

Pearl raised an eyebrow at the sudden answer, curious as to why Nufai was with THEM now. “They were? Why are you working for the Hierarchy then?”

“Because Nufai helped with their defeat.” Responded the twisted creature, making Pearl disturbed at the horrible answer. “

“You betrayed your own race to save your own skin? How could you do that?” Asked Pearl shocked.

“Opportunity. Much… opportunity.”

Pearl blushed at the horrid answers since she always was a Gem whose emotions were never truly in check, something that Nufai noticed and took opportunity of.

“Hmm, that is an interesting gesture.” Said Nufai, pointing out the blush on Pearl’s cheeks. “Are you that emotional about everything? Or did you betray your kind as well for the same reason?”

Pearl took another blast at Nufai, who managed to side step again as he walked closer while still speaking, realizing just by her silence that he got his answer.

“You did! Then tell Nufai this, how did it feel? Did pleasure course through your veins? Did your treachery hurt the ones you cared about? Did misery and guilt cloud your mind but gave you a powerful strength of ecstasy?”

Pearl didn’t know how to respond or deal with this Nufai properly now, ever since her creation, she always had to deal with foes that she had knowledge of or attacked first rather than speak, but not only did Pearl not know what this creature was, but it seemed like it would rather talk and attack her emotionally than actually swipe at her right now, and the way Nufai spoke to her about everything just felt… disturbing and strange.

“You can tell Nufai. I ‘ve always wanted to share tortures with someone.” Said Nufai in a slithering tone. “And Nufai can tell that you have many tortures inside, all of them delicious in their special chaotic manner.”

“I won’t tell you anything.” Responded Pearl, as Nufai chuckled darkly once more in reply. “A slimy thing like you would never know how I feel.”

“On the contrary, Nufai knows exactly how you feel.” Rebutted Nufai, using his psychological torture on Pearl. “It felt good, didn’t it? Abandoning your own kind and taking advantage of other opportunities at hand. Nufai feels that way as well.”

Pearl couldn’t help herself but argue now, convinced that this Nufai was not going to attack and lowered her spear. “It wasn’t like that.”

Nufai then stopped walking, just in claws reach in front of Pearl while responding to the Gem’s argument, offering his twisted philosophy to Pearl.

“It has always been like that, Crystal Gem.” Responded Nufai, empathizing the Crystal Gem part. “You are no different than Nufai. You saw an opportunity to take advantage of and you went for it, and now you are much better off than you were before. You are just like Nufai, a fellow opportunist.”

“I’m not like you. I am nothing like you!” Argued back Pearl. “I didn’t sacrifice my race to save myself, I left them to fight for a good cause, and that cause is to protect this galaxy from scum like you and what they are now!”

Nufai kept the part about the Home world Gems similar to scum in mind, gaining a hint of knowledge that they must have changed in a way, while moving one eye away to see that his transport ship was close.

“Maybe you’re right, you’re not an opportunist like Nufai. Do you know why?”

Suddenly, Nufai slashed his claws towards Pearl, who cursed herself for falling into the trappings of an argument and back flipped away at the last second, raising her spear towards Nufai who answered for Pearl.

“Because you are nothing but an emotional wreak! A frail, clinging, pathetic thing! You let your feelings of sympathy and empathy get in your way, and you push down your pain and misery and expect it to leave! Release it, and you will be just like me! Truly free of your emotional oppression and able to make all others suffer for your pleasure!”

“I’d rather die!” Exclaimed Pearl, now furious at Nufai’s vile words and no longer has a desire to argue, now replaced with a desire to finish off Nufai here and now.

Nufai then sharpened his claws, slashing them against each other and let out sparks of orange electricity to intimidate the Gem warrior, as Pearl went into her fighting stance to face Nufai in a duel.

“Then Nufai shall grant your wish!”

Nufai sprinted towards Pearl, his claws open and ready to slash apart the Gem warrior, as he swiped both claws in a scissor pattern, only for Pearl to leap forward and land behind Nufai and thrust her spear at the alien’s back, who managed to grab the spear behind him with his long arms without turning and spun around with Pearl still hanging onto her weapon.

While spinning, Pearl yanked the spear away from Nufai’s grip and leaped away from the alien, lsnding perfectly with a twirl as Nufai turned to see Pearl pointing her spear and firing energy blasts at him.

Nufai sprinted at her again, dodging each blast with his surprising swiftness and speed and slashed a claw at Pearl, who parried the attack with her spear’s blade and pushed away his claw, while Nufai slashed rapidly at her with great speed, each swipe parried perfectly by Pearl in a majestic ballet manner, twirling and flexing her arms and legs in a graceful manner, making the duel into a dance of blades.

“Nufai is impressed with your skills. Making death beautiful is something rare with only us.”

Pearl ignored the comment from Nufai, seeing a blind spot that the alien left unchecked and swiped away, making Nufai leap backwards while Pearl leaped forward, twirling in a circle and swinged her spear at Nufai’s side, making him duck his head and block another spear thrust down on his head as he ducked, engaged in a struggle to lift the spear away from the top of his head.

Using a dirty trick, Nufai used his long legs to kick Pearl in the gut, knocking the wind out of her from the sudden force and released her spear’s grip on his claws, giving Nufai the chance to strike back and leaped forward while Pearl was down on the ground, standing on top of her and prepared to bring down his claws to impale her on her Gem.

Pearl tactically rolled her head away from the implement, doing so two more times before using her spear to fire a close range blast at Nufai, hitting him on his chest protected by his skeletal like armor, slightly staggering him while Pearl used that to her advantage, flipping backwards in a fluid motion and kicked Nufai’s head while doing so, knocking him back but still standing, and landed gracefully with a twirl.

“I’m not that easy to beat.”

Pearl went on the offensive again, not wanting to slow down and rapidly thrusted her spear blade at Nufai, catching the alien off guard as he parried each thrust in equally fast speeds with his claws while countering back, as both duelists parried, swiped, and thrust their attacks at each other with quick succession, somehow equal and unable to land even a scratch on one another.

“Nufai has not had a fight like this before.” Said Nufai, conversing with Pearl as he swiped a claw at her torso, only for it to be countered with a parry.

“Impressed, are we?” Replied Pearl, as she swiped her spear at Nufai, making him duck and counter with an upwards claw strike, doing a backflip to avoid it.

Nufai slashed once more in a scissor pattern, getting into another struggle with Pearl while answering her question.

“Very. The blades of blood and gore have never been so beautiful.”

Pearl just scoffed at Nufai’s disturbing reply. “You’re insane.”

Nufai chuckled at Pearl’s supposed insult. “Telling Nufai what is already known is a poor insult.”

Nufai broke the struggle this time, flipping Pearl’s spear away from her hands and tossing it aside, as Pearl leaped to her side to avoid another wide slash from Nufai’s claws, just inches away from scratching her Gem and managed to grab her spear before it hit the ground, beginning yet another equal parry and counter fight with one another.

Nufai then began to laugh sadistically, enjoying every single moment of this fight despite not being able to land a single killing blow on Pearl, causing the Crystal Gem to be confused at Nufai’s disturbing laughter.

“What’s so funny?” Asked pearl as she countered another deadly slash.

“This fight is so alive!” Answered Nufai manically, as he began to twirl around and attack with his claws in a spinning motion while Pearl did the same, continuing his manic speech.

“The two of us! Dancing in a flurry of blades under the moonlight, like a ballet of blades, so close to the one killing blow! When that moment comes, Nufai shall emerge victorious against such a worthy foe! The anticipation of your death draws so near and gives great pleasure to Nufai!”

Brushing off the sadistic dream of Nufai, Pearl twirled her spear as a new form of counter, making Nufai’s claws space out and gave her an opening to thrust her spear’s blade into his chest.

But when Pearl seemed to have the upper hand, Nufai’s eyes began to glow and red rings spinned inside his pupils, stopping pearl from having her killing blow and screamed out of pain and agony, dropping her spear and grasped her head from the immense pain she felt, as flashbacks of horrible memories began to pop up in her mind and caused her to lose sense of reality.

“Nufai won’t let you win easy, frail one.” Whispered Nufai, his whispers echoing in her mind as she screamed in pain from every word he uttered.

“Get out of my head!” Screamed out Pearl, her eyes closed as she still held her head in pain and kneeled, failing to notice Nufai deliver a swift kick to her chest and knocked her down.

“Nufai senses the pain and misery inside you, bottled up and ready to be unleashed. Nufai hopes to see that side of you soon.”

Nufai stood over Pearl again, grasping her and holding her down in a knelt position, his eyes returning to normal while Pearl opened her eyes, blushing her cheeks blue while tears streaked down her face. Whatever Nufai did, it made her mind vulnerable to all of the negative emotions that she has bottled up inside her, overwhelming her senses and warping her sense of reality, along with leaving her at the mercy of Nufai.

Nufai then saw his transport was almost at the temple, while hearing voices coming from the entrance to the top of the temple, realizing that he will have to go soon, but not before giving Pearl some parting words in a deathly whisper instead of finishing her off, trailing his claws across her face ever so slightly with the sharp blades, poking her chin up to make her face him.

She was just too fun for him to kill so quickly.

“Nufai must leave now, frail one. But I promise you, we will meet again in our intimate manner of blood, gore, and chaos. Nufai promises you that my dreams with you will come true, the dream of slitting your throat and wrists, showering your blood upon the ground and bathing in it, while gutting you to caress your intestines, to feel the soft, squishy matter against my skin, as I slowly and tenderly flay you alive and wrap your skin across Nufai’s body. Joy! A chorus of angels!”

Pearl had no idea if she felt disturbed by his sadism, his insanity, his depravity, his perversion. Everything about him was a living nightmare come true, and this nightmare was right in front of her, only letting her live just because the moment was not right for him.

She could only utter one word before falling unconscious.

“Nightmare.”

Chapter 4
“Pearl!” Shouted the voice of Steven from across the temple top, shocked to see Pearl lying unconscious on the floor, while Garnet and Amethyst readied their weapons at Nufai, furious that their friend was injured.

“Ah, more Gems for Nufai to play with.” Commented the hideous creature in front of the Crystal Gems, taking notice of Amethyst and Steven. “A shame I don’t have time for you all.”

“What did you do to her, you bug eyed creep?!” Shouted Amethyst, cracking her whip towards Nufai and wrapped it around one of his claws.

Nufai quickly slashed the whip with his other free claw, looking above him to see that his saucer transport was right above him, spinning in a circular motion like a classic saucer would. The hideous beast stepped back, but not before running down one of his claws down Pearl’s face in a perverted manner.

“Your friend that you call Pearl is fine. She is just tired from our time together.” Answered Nufai, letting out a dark chuckle that scared Steven senseless. “Such a precious one indeed.”

“What’s wrong with you?” Asked Steven tearfully, running up to the unconscious Pearl with the other Crystal Gems.

Nufai just chuckled darkly at Steven’s question. “Many things are wrong with Nufai, young one. But my victory against your Pearl is not.”

Before Garnet and Amethyst could make a move on Nufai, he made his eyes have red rings around it once more and stared directly at them, making them stop and cry out in pain while Steven stayed down with Pearl, looking away from Nufai’s gaze.

“Some other time, Crystal Gems.” Whispered Nufai, his hushed voice echoing to the two Crystal Gems caught in his gaze. “But Nufai will finish you all off as well, especially the one you call Pearl.”

Nufai then broke his gaze, making the Gems snap out of the nightmarish trance as they barely managed to look back at Nufai, seeing that he was bowing lowly to them in some form of twisted courtesy.

“I bid you all farewell. And I offer a parting gift in return.”

This parting gift would come in the form of a bright orange flash, emitting from the bottom of the transport ship as it let out a large yellowish beam on the ground, teleporting two large figures in front of the Gems.

The figures were much larger than Nufai, reaching to be at least nine feet tall, similar to the Lost Ones in the sense that the alien creatures had glowing eyes, stooped postures, grey skin, and three digits on each limb. But the creatures appeared to be heavily mutated from what they once were, having a much larger muscle mass, an extended jaw lined with razor sharp teeth and had no form of armor on, instead it had a thick hide for protection and no weapons except their bare fists and brute strength.

The creatures began to growl at their puny foes, and beat their large fists on their chests to intimidate the Gems and roared loudly, all while Nufai began to disappear in the same yellowish beam, as if he was going up the transport ship.

“Sweet nightmares to you all, Crystal Gems.”

Nufai fully disappeared in the flash, the transport ship now levitating away from the temple and quickly ascending high in the sky, too high and fast for the Gems to follow, though the large alien beasts down with them made things more complicated.

“What the heck are those things?!” Exclaimed Amethyst, as the hulking beasts roared furiously at the dwarfed Gems, making the Gems ready their weapons to fight back.

“I don’t know. They’re new.” Answered Garnet, unsure of what these new beasts were. “We just need to get out of-

Before Garnet could finish her sentence, one of the beasts swiped its large hand and grabbed ahold of her, clutching tightly to prevent escape and threw her down on the ground, forming a small crater just below it.

“Garnet!” Called out Steven, as one of the other beasts slammed their hands in front of the child, while Garnet struggled to get up.

“Amethyst! Take Pearl with you and get out of here! Now!” Ordered Garnet, as she used her gauntlets to grab onto the incoming fist of the alien beast trying to slam her into the ground.

“But-

“Just go!”

The beast towering Garnet slammed both of its fists down, knocking her down again while Amethyst picked up the unconscious Pearl, and began to run back into the temple with Steven to escape, as the second beast started chasing after them, letting out a loud roar as it chased the fleeing Gems.

Garnet tried running after the alien beast chasing her friends, but the other creature behind her grabbed her and held her up in the air, squeezing the Gem as tightly as possible to prevent escape and tried chomping down on her with its large jaw filled with razor sharp teeth. Garnet used her gauntlets to stop its mouth from closing on her, holding the alien beast’s jaws open and pulled on its large tongue, causing the beast immense pain and made it let go of her, dropping her on the ground while she took the chance to jump up and uppercut the beast on its lower jaw, knocking it down on the ground.

While Garnet was still occupied with the alien beast, the creature’s partner was still chasing after the other Gems, taking a swing at them with its muscular hands, just missing since the Gems ducked their heads and ran inside the small open entrance to go back down, an entrance too small for the beast to fit through as it tried to fit its large hands through the small entrance, just out of reach from the Gems

“Ha! What are you going to do now, fatty?” Taunted Amethyst, running down the spiral staircase with Pearl still unconscious in her arms while Steven panted from behind, frightened when hearing the angry roars of the alien beast behind them.

Seeing that there was no way for the creature to fit, it decided to make its own entrance by slamming repeatedly on the stone ground of the temple as hard as it could, crumbling the floor beneath as it fell through the floor and the stone stairs, causing the fleeing Gems to fall down in midair with the beast.

The beast fell the furthest down with the Gems just above it midair, crushing through a few stone floors until landing in the same room with the first encounter of the Lost Ones, landing on its back while Amethyst grabbed Steven with one arm and Pearl on the other, landing a few feet away from the beast on her feet and dropped Steven and Pearl, though Pearl’s drop was accidental.

Amethyst face palmed herself for the mistake, even if it was a little funny despite the situation they were in.

“Oops. Forgot she’s still out of it.”

Steven then shook Pearl gently, pleading Pearl to wake up. “Come on, Pearl. Please.”

The panicked Steven noticed the alien beast chasing them was getting up, dazed as it shook the stone off of it body and stared right at the Gems furiously and roared, making Amethyst get out two whips.

The Beast raised its hands up, wanting to slam on the ground like a gorilla to crush the Gems like paste, but Amethyst quickly lashed her whips and wrapped them around its hands, whipping them together to send a current of purple energy course through the whips and explode in front of the beast, creating a huge blast of expelled energy and smoke and sent the beast back, making it walk backwards from the pain while Amethyst moved forward, continually going forwards and sending more blasts at the beast’s whip curled hands.

It started to get used to the pain quickly however, somehow each blast made the beast feel less pain and more rage, as it swung its arms around with Amethyst holding on, swinging her up and slamming her down on the ground, while taking advantage of his whip bound hands and pulled the purple Gem towards it, giving the incoming Gem a massive head butt from its immense skull, making go so far from the force that she crashed into a partially destroyed statue, destroying whatever remnant was left of it.

“Amythyst!” Shouted Steven, now more terrified than before as he saw the beast charge at him, holding its arm by its body while doing so to ensure maximum charging damage while Steven shook Pear more rapidly now, now begging Pearl to get up.

“Please Pearl! You got to wake up! The big scary alien thing is coming towards us!”

A small and faint gasp could be heard from Pearl, not audible enough for Steven as he activated his shield in panic, making it large enough to stop the alien beast’s momentum and stop in place, making it roar as it started to throw massive punches at the shield, each hit stronger than the last as Steven struggled to keep it up.

Pearl slowly opened her eyes, seeing nothing but blurs and twisted dark imagery, the blurs appearing to be shadows of several other gem figures, gem figures that appeared to be in pain as if they were being shot, stabbed, and crushed, making Pearl hyperventilate faintly from the horrid sights, until eventually seeing the shadowed illusion of Nufai suddenly pop up in front of her, making her gasp as loud as she could out of fear and panic from the living nightmare.

A familiar could be heard faintly after that, Pearl gained her vision back slowly and could see a small and chubby figure right above her, appearing to be scared and even tearful, while hearing the faint sounds of a loud force pounding close by her.

“Pearl!”

The voice calling out to her was now Steven’s voice, making her snap back into reality and regained her vision, seeing clearly that she was lying on the ground and looked at the panicked Steven, who was close to getting his shield broken by the alien beast pounding on it.

“Steven?” Said Pearl confusingly, wondering what was going on.

She turned her head to see a large alien creature breaking through Steven’s shield, exhausting the poor child and made him nearly faint from using up most of his power.

“Steven!” Exclaimed Pearl, now fearing for Steven’s life as she saw the alien beast ready to deliver the crushing blow with a slam, making Pearl flip up and grab Steven in her arms, barely managing to dodge the creature’s slam that sent the two Gems flying back from the force.

Pearl rolled along the ground with Steven in her arms still, struggling to get up since she was still disorientated from the rude wakeup call and saw Amethyst next to her, also relived that Pearl was fine.

“Took you long enough.” Quipped Amethyst, grateful to have her friend and teammate back up to help out and helped her and Steven up.

“Pearl!” Exclaimed Steven, giving the Gem a quick hug of relief despite being exhausted, but it did take its toll on the boy. “Ugh, so… tired.”

Pearl wanted to give Steven a hug back, but she noticed the large beast in front picking up some crumbled stone, throwing it at the Gems as Pearl took out her spear and slashed the stone apart, while Amethyst used her whip to grab some of the pieces and threw it back at the alien beast, who just punched the stones away in response.

Pearl had no idea what was going on, but she didn’t bother to ask questions now, all that mattered was keeping Steven safe and defeating whatever monster was in front of her, telling Steven to step back for safety as she and Amethyst charged at the beast first to catch it by surprise.

“We could use Garnet here.” Said Pearl, twirling around the large alien beast as it tried to punch her, gracefully dodging the punches to distract it while Amethyst jumped on its hunched back, coiling her whip around the beast’s mouth like a muzzle.

“She’s kind of busy right now. As in, fighting another one of these big guys.” Replied the purple Gem, pulling the beast’s head up while it tried to shake her off, swinging around and holding on like it was a rodeo show, as the beast constantly slammed around the ground in a fit of rage.

“Another one? By herself?” Exclaimed Pearl worryingly, as she jumped up and grabbed Amethyst, getting her off the beast before she was flung off and put her down on the ground, while the beast grabbed the whip around its large mouth and tore it off, letting out a huge roar and beat its chest angrily.

“She can handle it… I think.”

O-O-O

Garnet was struggling in her one on one fight with the alien beast on top.

She had faced many physically powerful beasts before, but this one was much stronger than other, it reminded her of the fight she once had with Jasper, if Jasper was a mutated and hideous beast with an even bigger temper.

Every time she landed a successful blow on the alien, it seemed to only get angrier and resist pain even more. An example of that occurred just now as Garnet dodged a punch from the beast, leaving itself open for an attack and punched the large alien in the gut, knocking the wind out of it in the process but not delivering as much pain she thought she would.

The beast returned back with a swift blow of his own, making Garnet block by crossing her gauntlets together, knocking her away while her feet stayed on the ground, sliding through the stone until she was just at the edge of the large whole the other alien beast had created.

The beast then leaped towards Garnet, jumping up in the air and ready to smash her from above, as Garnet jumped up as well, avoiding the slam coming towards her as the beast landed, causing some more stone in front to crumble and fall down, making an even bigger hole in the ground while Garnet took the opportunity to punch the beast right at its back, punching so hard that she swore she could hear a few bones break.

But broken bones weren’t enough to stop the beast, it quickly recuperated and grabbed Garnet once more with its hands, this time leaping back from where it leaped from before, slamming its hands down so Garnet could feel the impact first as she was slammed down on the stone ground, unable to get out of its grasp this time while she felt her body practically break and even her shades cracked as well.

The beast then turned around with Garnet still in its hands, slamming her down over and over in a fit of rage like a ragdoll, until the beast tried once more to chomp down on a more weakened Garnet. The Gem leader acted quickly this time to not engage with another struggle, taking the opportunity to punch the alien beast at its eye, a cheap shot, but a shot that saved her life since the beast felt a sharp pain in such a sensitive area, dropping her on the ground while she tried to get up.

Not wanting to get hit in the eye again, the beast clapped its hands together in front of Garnet, sending her flying backwards from the force of the clap while rubbing its punched eye. Garnet then got up, panting and weary from all of the punishment she was taking and dealing to such a large beast, still not willing to give up and lose to some mindless alien creature that only wanted to destroy, especially if it was the Hierarchy’s.

“You’re strong. But not as strong as me.” Said Garnet to the alien beast in front, who roared in response and began to charge at her again, fists at the ready.

Garnet also charged with the same method, albeit faster due to her size, as both she and the beast threw a powerful punch, both fists colliding with one another with neither backing down, while the powerful force of the collision practically made the ground rumble beneath them, making Garnet concerned about the stability of the stone temple’s top, unsure if it could handle this fight any longer.

She was also concerned about the other Gems, hoping that the other alien beast did not kill them and wanted to end this fight so she could get to her teammates and friends in time.

The beast decided to swing more punches first, as Garnet matched it blow for blow, each opponent continually pounding into one another with their brute strength and unwilling to back down until this fight was over, with only one opponent coming back alive.

Garnet’s swift speed had the advantage however, taking advantage of it and swung much faster punches to the alien, each punch hitting a new spot on its body so it could back down. Despite constant blocking from the creature, it knew that it wouldn’t last any longer, as each punch from Garnet pushed it back and made it ever so closer to getting knocked out or worse.

Every hit did some kind of damage to it, bones were cracking and even breaking, its hide getting more bruised, its jaw getting uppercutted and several teeth were seen flying out of its mouth, all of the blows were even causing internal bleeding since its organs began feeling the blows too, despite the mass adrenaline it felt, resisting pain and being unable to feel it didn’t mean you were invincible.

The creature let its guard down now, struggling to keep its balance as it tried to stand up, but failed since it was now on its knees, its large hands were supporting it while Garnet began trading blows at its head, losing even more teeth than ever, even green blood started to squirt out from its gums from losing its teeth in such a forceful way, while Garnet was relentless in her attack, even switching from its head to its gut like a professional boxer.

One more swift punch to the gut made the beast suddenly vomit green bile and blood from its mouth, making Garnet step back so she wouldn’t be drenched in the waste, while the beast threw up a few more times, as more blood and bile came out, even some partially digested bones of some kind of alien creature it didn’t finish digesting.

Disgusted and feeling certain that the creature was done, seeing that it was not even bothering to move from its position, Garnet turned around to go to the rest of the Gems for help after hearing the slams and rumbles from beneath.

But the creature, pumped with the last of its adrenaline left, charged at Garnet from behind and grabbed her despite his weakened state, deciding that if it would die, it would finish off its opponent with it. The creature then took a suicidal approach, and threw itself off the top with Garnet, beginning to plummet down to the wasteland ground outside with the Gem in its tight grasp, wanting to crush the Gem with its body and impact of the fall.

Garnet used her gauntlets to pull the alien beast’s hands off of her, now easier to do with its weakened state and was falling midair close to the creature, who tried to swipe at her to grasp her again, but failed to do so as she floated above the creature, who turned its body to face her.

That would prove to be a fatal mistake for the creature.

“If I’m going down, you’re landing first!” Said Garnet to the alien beast, refusing to die to the suicidal tendencies of the beast as she extended her gauntlets out and her body in a straight form, increasing the size of her gauntlets to make herself fall faster from the force of gravity and make her fists have contact with the beast.

The beast let out a strained but angry roar, unable to do anything else except feebly swat at Garnet with the little strength that was left, falling even faster to the ground with Garnet’s increased weight until final landing onto the wasteland ground, sending a large burst of force around the area and formed a massive crater as well, finally ending the fight between the strong opponents.

Garnet was now lying on top of her defeated opponents, making her gauntlets shrink back to normal and put them away, managing to get up and stood on top of her fallen foe, now dead from the impact with its body and organs crushed, not breathing in the slightest as green blood leaked out of its agape jaws and spilled onto the ground.

Garnet simply shook her head at the sight and thought about Nufai’s previous words, as she made one last comment before running back to the temple to try to get to her friends and comrades.

“Some gift.”

Chapter 5
“Oh man.” Quivered Steven, observing the fight between Pearl and Amethyst against the alien beast in front.

Steven thought this was going to be one of the more fun missions with the Gems, the perfect way to relive boredom in his day, go to some ancient temple, find an old Gem artifact, and maybe get to fight some scary monsters to complete the day. But he wasn’t expecting to find a room of dead aliens that he had never seen before, and the very same aliens come back to the temple to try to kill him and the Gems for no reason, but he knew the Gems had an idea why.

As he watched the battle unfold in front, Steven noticed that the Lost Ones who were knocked out were suddenly regaining consciousness, shaking off the rough housing they had received and chittered to one another to call out for each other.

“Oh no.” Steven mumbled softly to himself, as he began to shout out to Amethyst and Pearl to warn them. “Guys!”

Pearl was the first to hear Steven, her hearing for the child’s voice practically doubled because of the danger they were in, turning her head after avoiding another slam from the alien beast to see Steven calling out for help and noticed the Lost Ones picking up their plasma guns.

“Steven! Get away from there!” Exclaimed Pearl worryingly, practically losing it as she ran towards Steven to protect him while Amethyst was left to fend off the beast by herself.

“Seriously Pearl? Is this payback for the chips?” Quipped Amethyst, while she took out two whips and coiled them around the alien beast’s arms from behind, pulling backwards to bring it down on the ground to stop it from chasing after Pearl.

Pearl didn’t want to argue with Amethyst now, what mattered was saving Steven from those twisted creatures she so desperately wanted to get rid of, as she ran over to Steven and picked him up and leaped away, avoiding the plasma blasts in the process.

The Lost Ones screeched at the Gem, weakened from the previous fight and chittered to one another, deciding that there was only one option left since they knew they wouldn’t be going back home.

The aliens pressed a yellow circular button on the front of their collars, causing it to glow red and beep rapidly, while they screeched as loudly as possible, shouting out some kind of fanatical scream in their chittering language at Pearl and Steven and charged at them, running as fast as they could to the Gems.

“What are they doing?” Asked Steven, unsure what the Lost Ones were trying to do.

“Steven, just activate your bubble and don’t look.” Said Pearl softly, knowing exactly what was going on.

Steven complied and activated the bubble, as the two Gems were surrounded by the Lost Ones who were punching at the bubble, unable to break through while Pearl held Steven close to her in her motherly embrace, covering the child’s eyes and ears to muffle the screeches.

“Pearl?”

“It’s okay, Steven. Just don’t look.” Said Pearl softly, closing her eyes as well until she heard the dreadful sounds of exploding plasma.

She barely peeked to see that the Lost Ones had explosive collars on them, only used in last effort situations such as this to take themselves out with their enemy, a suicidal and fanatical tactic that Pearl had seen so many times before. The aliens exploded in bursts of green plasma energy, disintegrating their bodies until nothing but the fragments of their blood red cuffs, collars, and guns were left, scattered around the room with no trace of bodies at all.

When Steven released the bubble, he saw only the fragments as well, looking up at Pearl in fearful curiosity to know what happened. Pearl just shook her head, not wanting to tell the boy what horrible actions had just occurred and Steven silently nodded in agreement.

“Can I get some help here?!” Shouted Amethyst to Pearl and Steven, who was just grabbed by the alien beast and thrown at them.

Pearl was hit by the flying Amethyst, just too late to leap away while Steven ran to the two Gems, helping them up while the alien beast roared loudly at them, ready to charge once more to finish them off.

Suddenly, three Lost Ones flew out the door, possibly the three that were trapped a few floors under from earlier, along with Garnet who ran back into the room to see the alien beast turn its attention to Garnet, which was exactly what she wanted to happen.

“Your friend wasn’t so tough.” Said Garnet to the beast, who roared angrily at Garnet and charged at her instead.

Garnet then took two Lost Ones in each of her hands, who activated their suicide collars in response to try to take Garnet with them in an explosion of plasma. The Gem leader knew they would do this however, and she took advantage of this by throwing them at the charging alien, blowing both of them up in a plasma explosion and slowed the beast down for a while, but was angered by the tactic and charged faster.

When the third and last Lost One activated his suicide collar, Garnet quickly grabbed him before it could have a chance to do anything else, and carefully aimed at the charging alien’s head, who began to roar loudly when it was just mere inches away from Garnet. In the perfect moment, the leader Gem threw the Lost One right into the alien beast’s gaping mouth as it roared, making it skid on its feet to stop while jumping out of the way and to the rest of the Gems.

The alien beast began to choke on the Lost One, trying to regurgitate it before it could suffocate, but it was too late for the beast.

Before it could choke out a breath, the collar exploded inside the alien beast’s large mouth, blasting apart the beast’s head in a plasma explosion that killed off the angry creature for good, its headless body fell down on the ground, no bleeding from the headless part of the body due to the intense burns of plasma on the fatal wound, though the body did twitch for a second before falling limp.

The Crystal Gems stood silent at the sight, until Amethyst spoke up.

“I gotta admit, that was kind of cool.”

“No, it wasn’t.” Replied Garnet, adjusting her shades while shaking her head. “I wish it didn’t have to come to that.”

“It’s not your fault, Garnet. They wouldn’t have surrendered anyways.” Said Pearl.

“Why not?”

The three Gems turned around to see Steven, having not a fearful but a sad expression on his face, a face that looked so much like Rose’s.

“They didn’t have to die.”

The Gems wanted to tell him a straight answer, but they just couldn’t do that to his face, it was too much like Rose’s. Even thousands of years ago, Pearl and Garnet recognized that face from Rose every time she felt sad about the old war with the Hierarchy, while Amethyst just felt bad for Steven having to see such a brutal thing like that happen.

They would have to tell him about the Hierarchy as soon as they got home.

Garnet put a hand on Steven’s shoulder to comfort him. “We’ll tell you all about it when we get back home.”

“And we’re going home now.” Inquired Pearl, wanting Steven and everyone else out of this temple. “They might send in more to make sure we’re dead.”

“Then let’s take them!” Exclaimed Amethyst confidently. “They’re not as bad as you said they were.”

“No. we’re leaving and that’s that.” Replied Garnet sternly. “We can’t underestimate them like before.”

Amethyst wanted to argue a point, but she knew that arguing with Garnet was a lost cause, so she kept quiet instead.

The Crystal Gems just walked over to the warp pad in the room, trying to ignore the dead body of the new alien creature that laid dead and headless, while passing over the fragments of the plasma guns and armor that were around, with unfortunately nothing intact enough to be useful to the Gems. Even the Home world Gem computer would have helped in some way, but that was destroyed by the Hierarchy, which was more of a loss to the Gems than the Hierarchy.

The Hierarchy didn’t need the information on the computer anyways.

When the Gems got on the warp pad, they hoped that it would teleport them to the temple since the pad appeared to be quite old and damaged, which somewhat explained why the pad teleported the Crystal Gems outside instead of this room. In a way, it made them wish Peridot was here with her robots to fix it.

The Crystal Gems then teleported away, hoping that where they would end up would be the right destination for them.

Unknown to the Gems however, there was a small object connected on the edge of the warp pad that appeared to be a tiny blood red colored device, shaped like a sphere and had small dishes on the top, which began to rotate rapidly when the warp pad activated.

O-O-O

In the transport ship that Nufai was on, the sadistic alien could be seen standing by some kind of high tech computer in front, the room he was in is some kind of bridge area of the transport ship, the area around was colored in the same blood red color except the floor, which was more of a lighter color of the blood red and appered to have hexagon shaped tiles as well, the bridge area located right in the top middle of the saucer transport ship that was flying through space.

The bridge itself had a large computer terminal in the center that Nufai was at, along with two alien crew members by his side, and several other crew either at smaller computer terminals or walked around performing other duties.

The alien greys here appeared similar to the Lost Ones, though their heads were larger and their backs were straight, having even longer arms and legs and black eyes instead of red.

Nufai was now looking at the red holographic screen of the main computer with the two alien grey crew members, who were Nufai’s advisors that assisted him with anything he needed.

“Is the tracking device I planted working?” Asked Nufai to one of his advisors on his right, who was tracking the coordinates of the warp pad that was connected to the other warp pad on the temple.

“Yes sir. The device is working successfully as you planned.” Responded the right advisor, pressing several red holographic buttons labeled in their strange alien language to track the coordinates.

“Ant signs of life from the Lost Ones or the Brutes?” Asked Nufai to the other advisor on his left, who multitasked to scan for any life signs of Nufai’s troops at the ancient temple, coming up with negative results.

“Negative sir. They’re all dead.” Responded the left advisor, which made Nufai chuckle with amusement.

“Good. Nufai shall meet them soon then.”

“Sir, if I may?” Inquired the left advisor. “There was no point in wasting your forces against foes that can defeat them. More would have been sufficient to-

“I like to play games with my foes, advisor.” Interrupted Nufai. “Nufai is very talented in these games and they are not without purpose. This was merely a test of their abilities that they have passed.”

“Of course, sir. I apologize for my ignorance.”

Nufai just scoffed at the advisor. “If you were like Nufai, you would understand.”

“Sir. We’ve successfully tacked down the coordinates between the two Gem warp pads.” Said the right advisor.

“Show me.” Ordered Nufai, who saw a red holographic picture image of the planet Earth.

“This is the world where the connecting warp pad originated from.”

“Earth? The backwater planet in the Sol system?” Said Nufai, surprised at the destination. “Where exactly on Earth?”

The right advisor put two of his three digits on the hologram, specifically on the region of North America and slid both digits apart, zooming in on the region to show a holographic image of some kind of large peninsula on the east coast of the United States, which also had a blipping yellow dot that indicated where the warp pad’s coordinates are at.

“Interesting, and so close to us as well.” Said Nufai, looking at the holographic image of the Delmarva Peninsula.

“Should we contact Kamal Re’x, sir? This planet is only a few star systems away from our position.” Asked the right advisor.

“Yes. Contact him now.”

The right advisor complied and pressed a few buttons, sending a signal to contact this Kamal Re’x that Nufai requested to talk to. What appeared on the screen was the image of their supposed leader, who appeared to be in proper coloring instead of holographic red.

“Avert your eyes from your lord.” Demanded Kamal in a slightly echoing but intimidating voice, making Nufai and the two advisors bow their heads down in respect.

“Now you may rise.”

The aliens raised their heads up to get the clear image of their leader.

Kamal Re’x’s most notable appearance differed from most of the alien “greys”, mostly because he seemed to be incased in some kind of machine apparatus, the design of the apparatus covered most of his light grey body except his limbs and part of his face, which revealed his glowing yellow eyes and a part of his face, the rest of it had small black tubes attached to the top part of his forehead, and his mouth was covered with some kind of rebreather.

The apparatus Kamal wore was colored mostly blood red, with the softer and flexible parts colored grey on the sides to allow his arms and legs to move, with large black tubes on each side of his body, all connected to some kind of large glowing green generator of sorts on the back of his apparatus, which was mostly covered in black machine material of blood red and black coloring, as if it was keeping him alive.

The apparatus’s front top also looked like it had some kind of crown like object attached, wich had two small wing like parts on the side of the apparatus and blood red spikes on top of it, along with two horn like pieces on the top “forehead” of the apparatus, with some kind of thin glowing orange ring device in the “forehead’s” center.

Kamal Rex’s face and only part of his mostly cybernetic implanted apparatus appeared on the computer screen, as Kamal began to speak in his slightly echoing and demanding voice, speaking in a way that sounded like he was not talking through his rebreather, but telepathically instead.

“What news do you bring me, Nufai?” Asked Kamal in a demanding and harsh tone. “Is it about the Gem vermin?”

“Yes, my lord. I had captured and interrogated one of the Home world Gems for information. All I could get was that their technology had improved significantly and that they’re trying to reclaim their old worlds once more.”

“Bah! Only desperate weaklings like them would want such a pointless effort to be seen through.” Commented Kamal, actually disgusted that the Gems were still alive. “They have no idea that their destined extinction is near once more, and this time, I will finish what we started eons ago for the glory of the Hierarchy and grant the Gem scum the apocalypse that they deserve, along with everything else living in this worthless excuse for a galaxy.”

“And the Overseers shall reward you greatly as before for your many accomplishments, my lord.” Added Nufai, fueling Kamal’s already large ego. “They are always pleased with your victories.”

“That is because I do what is best for this universe, thinning and culling the herds of all weaklings so only the strong will survive. Only the weak call my accomplishments genocide, and those very same weaklings take those words to their dug graves, always by my hand.” Further commented Kamal, enforcing his beliefs to Nufai to ensure loyalty. “You understand this just as much as me when you sacrificed your race.”

“Of course, my lord. Why else would I have done what I did?”

“Because you have the right mindset in our universe, the purging of the weak and the survival of the strongest. Something only the Hierarchy understands.” Answered Kamal, having no regard or care about Nufai’s now extinct race.

Kamal then changed the subject, for as much as he wanted to gloat about how great and perfect he is and how much he deserved to rise from Underseer of the Hierarchy’s remote mining operations to Overseer, he wanted to know anything else important from Nufai.

“Is that all you have to share with me?”

“That is not all, my lord.” Said Nufai, wanting to share more information. “I have recently encounter more Gems than expected on the dead Gem world. But they are not part of the same Gems we know of, they are calling themselves the Crystal Gems instead.”

Kamal was slightly interested in that matter, but thought that these Crystal Gems were not much. “Really now? That should make my prolonged life easier. The more divided these worms are, the better they face their dooms.”

“We have also located where these Crystal Gems are hiding, on a planet called Earth.”

Kamal’s interests now perked up, mostly because he recognized that planet’s name. “Earth? That was one of the many planets selected for our mining operations. Why there on a planet filled with hairless apes out of all planets?”

Nufai’s answer was just as confused as Kamal’s question. “I am unsure of that matter, but I have a request for permission to scout ahead of the fleet to Earth to evaluate the situation.”

“Granted. I shall send you a command ship to your coordinates now.” Replied Kamal, waving his hand slightly. “I want you to determine how pathetic the defenses of that planet are along with how much there is to harvest, and wipe out these “Crystal Gems” before the fleet arrives for our mining operations, I want to purify the planet of weakness as soon as possible before we reach the Gem Home world.”

Nufai bowed respectfully to his leader. “Of course, my lord. Your request shall be granted.”

“As it should be, otherwise you will have to face me personally.” Warned Kamal, empathizing the warning. “There is a reason why my full name is Kamal Re’x the Abductor.”

“That is why as your most loyal servant, I never fail you.” Replied Nufai.

Soon, the command ship Nufai had been granted arrived from warp space, it appeared to be a ten times larger version of the transport saucer, but the gaped parts of the saucer had some kind of yellowish energy field covering it that acted as shields and covered the large hangers for more transport ships inside, along with having much more thicker armor and plasma weapons on the bottom, specifically on the bottom areas of the ship in the bottom center and the three long structures on the sides of the ship’s bottom that also had circular yellowish rings, which were actually heavy plasma weapons that fired orbital artillery or were used tin space combat, the transport ships such as Nufai’s had the same weapons but were obviously not as powerful.

“The command ship has arrived, sir.” Said the right advisor to Nufai. “We’re docking now.”

“Prove yourself once more Nufai, and you shall be greatly rewarded with a new position once more… or else.” Said Kamal, which made Nufai bow once more to end the transmission.

“As you wish, my lord.”

Chapter 6
The Crystal Gems arrived at the temple, warping right on the pad and luckily not somewhere else in Earth despite the tampered warp pad at the off world temple. A huge wave a relief came for the Gems before being replaced with guilt and worry once more, mostly because they had to tell Steven about the Hierarchy, especially now since they have actually returned.

“So… what’s the Hierarchy?” Asked Steven, making the Crystal Gems feel cold and scared about hearing that cursed name.

Garnet sighed heavily. “Take a seat at the couch.”

Steven complied and went over to the couch, sitting down at a comfortable position while accidentally stepping on the spilled chips.

“Sorry Pearl.” Said Steven, feeling guilty about making a bigger mess.

Pearl didn’t even get annoyed however, not even a twitch in her eye about something like this.

“Its fine, Steven. I’ll just clean it up now.” Replied Pearl softly, going to the kitchen to get the broom and clean up the mess.

Pearl came back as quickly as possible, and swept up the mess on the floor, her thoughts still on the Hierarchy instead of feeling irritated about the chips on the floor, though Amethyst decided to eat the remaining chips off the floor in her usual rude manner.

Pearl just gave the purple Gem a mean glare, to which Amethyst responded with a shrug and finished the chips there.

There was an awkward silence through the whole thing, as the rest of the Gems took their seats as well, with Pearl sitting the closest to Steven for his comfort, while Amethyst sat across the couch and lied down with her hands behind her back, and Garnet just stood across from the couch, her arms crossed as she pinched her fingers between her nose, unsure where to begin with what to say about the Hierarchy.

“Steven.” Began Garnet. “A long time ago before we came to earth, before your mother met us, the Gems were at war.”

“Wait, war?” Asked Steven, already shocked at such a thing. “With those aliens back at the temple?”

“Yes, Steven.” Pitched in Pearl. “The universe is much larger than you can imagine. Gems weren’t the only alien civilizations out there. In fact, there are practically billions, even trillions of alien lifeforms out there.”

“And the Hierarchy was one of them.” Said Garnet, now making Pearl more quiet when hearing their name.

“The Hierarchy? What are they?” Asked Steven.

That was not an easy question to answer, since the hierarchy were something… special to the Gems, and the Gems didn’t have that much extensive knowledge of the Hierarchy, but they told as much information as they could to Steven, even if they didn’t know what exactly the Hierarchy were as creatures.

“Well… where to begin?” Said Pearl, thinking where to start with the Hierarchy. “For starters, they’re not from around here, as in, they’re not from our galaxy.”

“You mean they’re from, outer outer space?” Asked Steven, making Pearl raise an eyebrow at the strange question, but went along with it anyways.

“Yes. And they have advanced technology that managed to help them reach our galaxy, and we don’t know where they came from, despite how long we’ve lived, we can’t answer every question about them.” Said Pearl, including whatever little knowledge general knowledge she knew.

“Maybe they came here to make a new home?” Asked Steven, making Pearl cringe in response to the question, trying to find a kinder way to break it down to Steven that the Hierarchy were invaders.

“They’re more like visitors that-

“That want to vaporize everything.” Commented Amethyst, having a say in the matter. “I wasn’t actually around when they first came, but from what Garnet and Pearl told me, they’re not very nice.”

“One step at a time.” Warned Pearl, while Amethyst rolled her eyes.

“But, why war?” Asked Steven, going back to his first question. “No one should be fighting each other.”

Pearl put a hand on the child’s shoulder. “Remember when I said that not all Gems are good?”

Steven nodded in understanding while Pearl continued.

“The same thing applies to other aliens too.”

Steven couldn’t believe that, there was no way he wanted to believe that there were other aliens out there that could be as hostile as the Home world Gems.

“Didn’t you try to be friends? Offer space gifts?” Asked Steven.

“We tried, but the Hierarchy wanted war instead.” Answered Garnet, remembering the first contact with the Hierarchy that started that old war.

“We didn’t know why they wanted to fight at first, but the longer we fought, the more we learned about the horrible truth.” Said Pearl, peeking Steven’s curiosity.

“What?” Asked Steven.

That was a question that would be difficult to answer, since the Hierarchy were similar to a certain Gem faction in their goals, and Pearl wanted to find a way to answer it without painting a bad image of all Gems to Steven.

“They wanted to mine the galaxy for everything.” Said Amethyst out loud, finally speaking her word that shocked Steven with fear.

Pearl flustered blue to the blunt answer. “Amethyst!”

Amethyst just looked at Pearl with a non-chalet look. “What? It’s what they wanted to do.”

“But... that’s a lot like the Home world Gems.” Said Steven, shocked at the sudden revelation.

“They’re much worse than them.” Said Garnet, adjusting her shades to straighten them as a nervous tick.

“Why?”

Pearl took a deep breath, knowing that Garnet would explain the more serious parts as she now put her arm around Steven in a comforting manner, hoping to calm the child and brace him for the more harsh points of the Hierarchy.

“The Hierarchy saw everything as below them, everything they saw that wasn’t them was weak in their eyes. They wanted to kill our race and wipe out all life in this galaxy because of that.” Said Garnet, while Pearl held Steven closer and Amethyst just looked down.

Steven just kept quiet, wanting Garnet to continue what she was saying.

“The Hierarchy hate weakness, and they saw everything around them as weak because they had less advanced technology, not as many people, not as powerful as them, or if they were just in the way. The Gems were one of those many victims.”

Steven still stayed silent, his young mind was trying to process what these Hierarchy sounded like, and their reasoning behind their actions just seemed to confuse Steven so much. It was to be expected since these were very complex issues that adults would understand much better than a child, but even then, he saw all of those reasons as horrible.

“That’s not fair. They shouldn’t try to kill everyone because they don’t like you.” Said Steven, making Pearl hug Steven tightly.

“Oh, Steven.” Said Peal sympathetically. “I wish we didn’t have to tell you this now. We wanted to wait until you were older, then you would understand.”

“Understand? What can I understand about that?” Asked Steven. “They shouldn’t do stuff like that. Do they really think that’s right?”

Garnet shook her head out of unknowingness. “I don’t know. They just… do bad things because they do.”

“They sound really scary.”

Amethyst then interrupted once more. “I still can’t believe you guys almost died.”

At this point, Pearl was about to scream at the purple Gem until Garnet held her hand up, knowing that Steven would have asked more about the Gem/Hierarchy war.

Pearl then decided to speak again for Garnet.

“It wasn’t easy to beat them, but we did. We won against the Hierarchy but, a lot of Gems were lost. Along with several worlds being consumed by the Hierarchy.”

“Is it like that temple we found before?” Asked Steven.

“Yes. The temple we teleported to was on a gem controlled world, but it was one of many that fell to the Hierarchy.” Said Garnet, remembering the black wasteland landscape that surrounded the old temple. “It used to be filled with all kinds of life, until the Hierarchy came to strip it all away, and did the same to many planets until they reached the Home world.”

“They reached the home world?” Asked Steven softly, who never would have thought that the Hierarchy were so powerful that they could reach the Gem Home world.

“Pretty much.” Said Amethyst casually, while Pearl tried to hold in her anger from the purple gems attitude. “They tore through everything and cornered everyone on one planet, just like that.”

Steven was now scared out of his mind. An alien race not from his galaxy just suddenly invaded everything and almost killed all life? It sounded like a sci fi nightmare more than it did a cool sci fi movie.

“It was a horrible siege.” Said Pearl softly, trying to keep her composure. “Garnet and I were one of the few survivors to reach Home world, and all we could do was wait, wait and hope that we would make it out alive.”

“How did you guys win?” Asked Steven, since he knew that somehow the Gems beat the Hierarchy, otherwise the galaxy wouldn’t even be around.

Pearl’s attitude then perked up when she looked at the picture of Rose Quartz hanging above the front door.

“We met your mother.”

Steven then perked up as well, wanting to hear about the heroics of his mother as Pearl continued.

“When everyone was giving up hope, your mother was there to help us all out. She had this aura to her that stood out from all the other Gems, and it inspired all Gems to actually untie under one banner and take the fight back to the Hierarchy.”

Pearl put up a small smile, knowing that if it wasn’t for Rose, they would have been dead.

“We actually managed to beat back the Hierarchy with her guidance, and decimated most of their military before they decided to retreat when their leader died.” Pearl said proudly. “It was the most glorious thing I had ever seen.”

Garnet agreed with Pearl on that matter. “Rose saved our lives, Steven. Your mother saved us all.”

Pearl’s smile then faded, as she thought back to the recent encounter of the Hierarchy, remembering the words of Xeres swearing that the Hierarchy would return, and then thinking back to Nufai and his forces.

“But now she’s gone. And they’re actually back after all these years.” Mumbled Pearl, frowning at the realization that the Hierarchy have returned.

Steven then looked up at pearl, giving her a smile that was filled with hope.

“And we’re still here too. Come ‘on guys, we’re the Crystal Gems! We fight bad guys all the time and always save the day!” Said Steven, trying to encourage the Crystal Gems with hope. “There’s nothing we can’t handle!”

“He’s got a point, ya know.” Agreed Amethyst, standing up from the couch. “We thought that we would get our butts handed to us when Peridot and Jasper came here, but we won! We can take on those freaks!”

Garnet smirked at Steven’s enthusiasm while Pearl put up another smile for Steven, hugging him ever so tightly since his happiness is quite contagious.

“You’re so much like your mother, Steven.” Said Pearl softly, which touched Steven as he returned the hug.

The Gems released each other from their embrace, now finished with their little history lesson, as least the important parts for Steven to know. Then Steven’s stomach began to rumble, making the child a bit embarrassed that it happened so suddenly.

“Now I’m hungry.”

Pearl couldn’t help but giggle to the child’s actions, getting up from the couch in a better mood with Steven around.

“I’ll make you something to eat, anything you like.” Said Pearl, which made the child joyful at the sound of that as he began to chant, with Amethyst quickly joining in.

“Spaghetti and meatballs! Spaghetti and meatballs!”

Pearl eagerly went to the kitchen to cook up Steven’s meal, while not really much of a fan of eating food, she enjoyed the process of creating it, while Garnet followed suit to chat with Pearl once more out of earshot from Steven.

“I’m glad we didn’t have to tell him everything.” Said Pearl, getting the cooking supplies needed for Steven’s dinner.

“We only had to tell him what he needed to know.” Responded Garnet. “I know you don’t like sharing you war stories.”

Pearl turned to Garnet worryingly. “What if he asks them? I can’t just tell him about the pain and suffering I- we went through.”

Garnet just crossed her arms. “The boy is curious, but that’s how it’ll be with him. You’ll tell him when the time comes.”

“And how much time do we have left?” Asked Pearl. “How long will it be until the Hierarchy arrive to earth to “purify” it?”

Garnet was actually unsure about that question, not able to come up with a sure answer.

“It could be days, weeks, months, years. They could be here anytime.”

Pearl nearly fainted from the answer, covering her face with her hand out of worry.

“It’s been so long. Who knows how much they’ve advanced their technology. We just fought their newest weapons at the old temple too, those things that almost killed us. And that Nufai... I’ve never seen such an evil creature before, and it’s with the Hierarchy out of everyone.”

“The Hierarchy are a special kind of evil. But we-

“But nothing.” Interrupted Pearl, talking lowly so Steven wouldn’t her them talking. “It’s bad enough that the Home world decided to follow in their footsteps, but now they’re back again to finish what they started.

“They won’t finish anything.” Argued Garnet, but Pearl quickly rebutted back, while keeping her voice down.

“Yes they will! We barely have any weapons left to take down one of those huge walkers they like to use, and the humans, as surprisingly resistant as they are, don’t have the means to defend themselves for long, even with our help.”

Pearl just went on rambling, as Garnet approached her closer to calm her down.

“I can’t deal with them again, Garnet. I just-

Pearl then felt lightheaded once more, closing her eyes while trying to keep her balance, as she thought back once more about the old war and the painful memories.

Garnet then approached the woozy Gem, putting a hand on her shoulder and made her look up.

“We’ll find a way, Pearl. We always find a way.”

Pearl wiped away a tear from her face, trying to calm herself down.

“I’m just- I’ll make dinner now.” Said Pearl, going back to cooking Steven’s dinner. “We’ll talk about battle plans later, okay?”

Garnet nodded and walked away, leaving Pearl alone in the kitchen while Amethyst step aside for Garnet, walking into the kitchen to raid the fridge for anything to eat.

“Just helping myself to a dinner snack.” Said Amethyst, going to the fridge to eat whatever she wanted there.

Pearl just sighed and ignored Amethyst, which made the purple Gem stop what she was doing at look up at Pearl, surprised that she was ignoring her rude tendencies.

“That’s it? A sigh?” Asked Amethyst, expecting more than a sigh from Pearl. “I was expecting a lecture from your royal highness.”

“I’m not in the mood.”

Amethyst knew that something was really wrong now, closing the fridge and looked at Pearl intently.

“You can tell me what’s up if you want, I won’t bite you this time.”

Pearl just sighed as she put the spaghetti in the hot boiling pot of water.

“It’s about everything that happened today. Steven knowing about the Hierarchy, said Hierarchy’s return, and that awful creature Nufai.”

Pearl just expected Amethyst to laugh or mock her in some manner by now, maybe make a joke that Nufai is her boyfriend or something cruel like that.

“You had a rough day, P. I know how that feels.” Said Amethyst in the kindest tone possible, something Pearl hadn’t heard ever since Rose passed on.

“I almost died from a monster that has a crush on me.” Said Pearl, referring to Nufai and remembered his sadistic way of flirting. “It can’t get any rougher than that.”

“I don’t know, he seems kind of cuuuuuute.” Joked Amethyst, who received a slight shove on her shoulder that felt more like a light tap, who frowned back in response.

“I was just trying to cheer you up with a joke.”

“Amethyst! I-

Pearl calmed herself down, not wanting to get mad and cause another ruckus with the purple gem, blushed blue and spoke back softly.

“I’m sorry… I just have a lot to think about.” Admitted Pearl, understanding that Amethyst was not trying to intentionally make her mad this time. “You know how I feel about your jokes.”

Amethyst brushed off Pearl’s little moment, nodding understandably.

“It’s fine.”

The two Gems had a moment of silence, with Pearl focusing back on making Steven’s dinner while Amethyst just stood at the fridge, leaning against the fridge door while looking down, staying there until Pearl was almost done with the food, as if they shared the silence together, not a single word uttered to each other.

“I miss Rose.”

Pearl just frowned once more, saddened to her such a truth while almost dropping the plate of food for Steven.

“Me too” Pearl responded softly, feeling the same way.

Pearl decided to change the subject, thinking back to Steven about how hopeful the child is, just like Rose.

“Do you want some too? I’ve made more for you.”

Amethyst smirked a bit, appreciating the fact that Pearl actually made her some food too, even if she didn’t need to eat.

“Steven!” Exclaimed Amethyst across the kitchen. “We’re eating tonight!”

The two Gems at the kitchen could hear a joyful ‘Whoo!’ coming from the child Gem.

“Thanks Pearl.”

Pearl looked at Amethyst confusingly. “For what?”

“For putting up with me.”

Pearl smirked back at Amethyst, as the whole Gem family got together to have their peaceful moment with each other, even despite the revelation of the return of the Hierarchy.

It always helped to have these little moments.

O-O-O

Meanwhile, Nufai’s command ship could be seen in deep space, traveling at a steady pace towards earth for his mission. By the time he had passed the majority of the planets of the Sol system, seeing Earth after the short while was quite a relief, since multiple scans of each planet aside from Earth showed no results for anything valuable, meaning the Hierarchy’s forces could make a beeline towards Earth without any worries.

Except for the Crystal Gems.

“Sir. Earth is just within our scanners reach.” Said Nufai’s right advisor. “Initiating scanning process now.”

It didn’t take long for the command ship to scan the planet’s surrounding atmosphere, since multiple beeps could be detected on the scanners of the main computer the advisor was at.

“We’ve detected multiple objects surrounding the planet. They seem to be some kind of satellite devices.”

“Jam them. I don’t want us to be detected until the fleet arrives.” Ordered Nufai, wanting to keep stealth as a priority. “Send in a transport ship with Glyph Carvers towards this region, Nufai also wants an escort of Lost Ones, Grunts, and Brutes for protection on the first transport.”

Nufai pointed close by the yellow blip that showed the Delmarva Peninsula region, wanting to set up a base close by the location of Beach City that was isolated.

“Nufai shall go with the transport as well, the first Arrival Site shall act as the main outpost on the planet with Nufai in command.”

“Shall we send in a few Reaper Drones and a Detection Drone on the transport? It would make outpost expansion quicker.” Asked the left advisor.

Nufai considered the suggestion and answered immediately. “Granted. Scan the planet and inform Nufai on the results, then I will tell you where to send more transports for further expansion across the planet.”

“An early invasion, sir?” Asked the right advisor. “Only Commander Orlock would call for such tactics if we were detected early.”

Nufai chuckled darkly at the mention of Orlock, remembering all about the great commander and his commandments, from his honorable nature of combat, to his sympathy of the Hierarchy’s foes, to his great care of his soldiers in battle, always managing to inspire his armies to victory through similar aggressive tactics and for showing that he actually cares for the wellbeing of his soldiers more than the Hierarchy itself.

Nufai thought it was pathetic.

“Nufai’s tactics are Nufai’s alone, not to some glorified commander who likes to speak doubts of the Hierarchy and live freely.” Nufai leaned closely to the right advisor, giving him an intense stare. “Loyalists and admirers of Orlock are no advisors of mine.”

“I didn’t mean to offend you, sir. It was merely a-

Nufai then raised his claws at the advisor’s face, nearly slicing his head off in the process. “Do you know what these are, advisor?”

“Phase claws, sir.” Answered the advisor fearfully. “Weapons that can-

“Can cut through any material with ease.” Interrupted Nufai, holding the claws ever so closely at the advisor. “Not even molecular armor, the quintessential choice of protection for our forces, can resist the only weapons made by Nufai’s people that can slice through anything as if it were wet paper.”

Nufai then chuckled darkly once more, amused by the advisor’s fearful expression.

“Do you know what Nufai loves to use these claws on the most?”

Before the advisor could answer the question in hopes his life would be spared, his hope was taken away when Nufai jabbed the claws straight through the large head of the advisor, impaling him through his skull as green blood leaked out from the wounds while Nufai held him up, dangling the twitching advisor that stayed stuck on the claws before letting out a whispered word.

“Flesh.”

Nufai then swung his claw to the side, making the Advisor’s head slide out of the claw and was dragged down with his body to the ground, spilling the green blood across the floor while Nufai walked over to the corpse, the other advisor keeping his fearful thoughts to himself.

“A shame you weren’t my precious Pearl.” Commented Nufai, placing the blood stained claw on his tendrils to taste the enjoyable flavor of blood. “Her blood must taste much sweeter than yours.”

Nufai then turned to the other advisor, who looked scared out of his wits despite a bad effort to keep cool, as he silently prayed in his mind that Orlock were here instead of the psychopath in front.

“Send a cleaner drone to the bridge to wipe the blood away. Nufai shall take care of the body.” Said Nufai sternly, picking up the advisor’s dead body by his head with his clawed hand. “Nufai needs a new chew toy for the Brutes anyways.”

The advisor simply complied and called in a cleaner drone as Nufai exited the bridge.

“Of course, sir."