✪3✪

in that one picture? just a pile of hands (and one foot) with a face. she’s always shifting, though. sometimes there are horns.

in the end, it doesn’t really matter what she looks like. she’s the monster of this story, and will always be a reminder of everyone’s fears/anxieties/failures/regrets. and that sucks.

i know, right! you wouldn’t believe the narrative gymnastics i had to do to keep this monster lore/canon compliant. at one point i had three or four different plot things with four or five possible outcomes/explanations each, just in case canon contradicted one of them. and i had to make sure i didn’t contradict them either! it was a nightmare to keep track of. heckin’ Schrödinger's plot. every possible thread needed the chance to be true until it wasn’t.

...except for one minor, teeny tiny, enormous detail. i used to get SO ANXIOUS every time the show revisited some seemingly random thing. like, please, please don’t revisit what i thought was a throwaway episode, PLEASE, it’s literally the linchpin of this entire reality’s existence lmao.

and Rose. Rose! i was one of the non-believers when it came to the Pink Diamond theory. I just. what. i must have been sending myself psychic warnings from the future or something cause otherwise i have no idea why i would have stayed away from any Rose-related stuff for so long. yeesh.

i think. i’m having a moment right now. like, in retrospect, the fact that i didn’t actually have to change anything is so wild. it’s like i managed to run through a hallway of swinging axes and somehow made it to the other side entirely unscathed. except the axes were plot twists and i’m sitting here laughing hysterically at the whole experience, so maybe not entirely unscathed. hah.

nah, Peridot’s still era 2, so she wasn’t around for all that. When she got stranded on earth, Jasper was not yet a part of the team, but Rose and Lapis were pretty adamant about how sucking the life out of the earth was, like, not a great move and they definitely shouldn’t do that anymore.

they were so adamant, in fact, that Peridot thought they might try to shatter her or something if she told them about the gem experiments she’d been sent to check up on, so she never told them. for five thousand years. it would just be awkward if she said anything now! (don’t worry, Secret Team’s handling it.)

Jasper’s feelings are a bit more complicated. Rose is able to sway her pretty easily, mostly because she already has that self loathing thing going on. her Kindergarten was an embarrassment and the quality of the Prime Kindergarten is just a reminder of that, so she’s very stand-offish about the whole thing.

Rose, Lapis, and Jasper all know that Peridot has some connection to the Kindergartens and that she visits them often for some reason. they don’t like it, but also don’t try to stop her (once she finally gains their trust and officially joins the Crystal Gems, that is.)

Steven is conflicted. Peridot gets so enthusiastic when talking about the Kindergartens but it just makes everyone else uncomfortable. poor kid just wants everyone to be happy!

Amethyst is just happy she and Peri get to hang out.

she looks like a safe spot to hide behind.

uuuuuhhh... not really? not one i use anymore, anyway. @drawingandcrying will probably be the best place to find me, once i finally have time to draw again, whenever that is.

“yes,“ i say, immediately after updating.

for real, though, yeah. this might be it. the forever hiatus... maybe? the urge to update this thing always catches me by surprise, but it’s probably best to treat this as an indefinite hiatus.

yeah, that’s totally cool with me! i’m just happy you found some inspiration and hope you have as much fun with this au as i've had. <3

Jasper may or may not be a teensy bit jealous of her. not that she’d ever admit it.

nah, Lapis was just using her to mess with Jasper. it’s petty revenge for a fairly minor slight, but they tend to bring out the worst in each other, even when they’re playing nice.

Persephone, it is! when combining their powers, all i could think of was seasonal stuff (and also swampbending) but i also got caught up in the whole “dread Persephone” and “Persephone the destroyer” angle, as while Rose and Lapis’ powers have the capacity to create, they are also destructive.

also, i based that one panel on the Birth of Venus because why not and her overall look is based more or less on Dionysus because reasons.

don’t worry, you can’t get rid of me that easily! not when i’ve got some brand new assignments to procrastinate on!

oh, sure. getting stranded on earth was the best thing that’s ever happened to her. she wasn’t even that invested in the mission, anyway. 

until she is.

can’t live on earth if there is no earth to live on. after thousands of years of playing it safe, it’s about time she did something stupid.

nah, her gem was healed before Steven was born. those white marks are just the “scars” from previous tampering.

if you have any emotional attachment to any doors or walls, now would be a good time to say goodbye.

uuuh... i probably shouldn’t number them, since i keep randomly going back to wedge new comics in between already existing ones. but! i did just make a reading list, linking all plot relevant stuff in chronological order. hope that helps!

right? i wasn’t gonna colour that comic at all until i tried a pallet swap and it looked so nice i ended up colouring the entire thing. lol

rejuvenated!Jasper is an adorable awkward pineapple.