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[3rd POV]
Another day has come for the adventurous duo of the honourable Phosphophyllite and courteous Y/N to do work! And what better job to have than that which requires you to study and write down any and all findings on just about everything?
...EVERY JOB! Nobody likes looking at things and writing unnecessary details that will never be of any use to anyone every day! But, because of Phos being a clutz and utterly incompetent in every other field she was given this as her job, and Y/N was her assistant that usually did more work than her.
"Ugh, seriously, what's so special about rocks?" Y/N, you guessed it, sighed for the... billionth (?) time since he started working with his BFF.
"You're a rock, Phos," nonchalantly replied Y/N while drawing a rock, a normal rock, not Phos.
"Excuse me?! I'm an adorable girl with a very nice rump. I'll have you know!" Y/N could never understand how Phos didn't get embarrassed saying such boisterous things about herself, but he learned to completely disregard comments like these and regard them as just Phos being herself.
Y/N's mind was still plagued by the thoughts of the previous night, the same night he promised to return to his promise of finding a real, fun job for Cinnabar that only she could do. But, he soon realized just how hard that is going to be. Any work which requires a partner is out of the question, and Cinnabar does not like to fight so patrol was out of the question as well.
"Seriously, there has to be something we haven't discovered yet..," Phos was as per usual, whining.
Y/N sighed as he was broken out of his daydream, "Progress takes time Phos. Wouldn't say so...?"
"Why did you- Cinnabar?!" Phos nearly did a backflip from how startled she was by the sudden appearance of the red-haired individual.
"Haven't you two learned anything?" Y/N started to scribble something on the piece of paper he was holding. Cinnabar was clearly not happy but was also not angry at them, she looked... curious, "Well, whatever, not my problem."
It was very easy to tell that Cinnabar's attitude didn't sit well with Phos, "Hey! You shouldn't be walking around here either! Heliodor was taken around this area!"
Cinnabar stopped for a moment, thinking of whether she should or shouldn't even bother responding to the mint-haired lustrous Gem, "Yes, I know. I'm waiting for them to take me, have been so for a while now. Yet..."
"They never come," this time Y/N finished the sentence as he seemed to finally be done scribbling on the piece of paper. Now, he squatted down and used his own clipboard to begin folding the paper into an object of sorts.
"Exactly. But, you two just stroll along and look at that, the Lunarians come running!" Cinnabar was getting angrier by the second, the slight spikiness the floating bubbles of mercury around her attained serving as a visual representation of her frustration, "You're lucky, even the enemy loves you."
It was awkwardly silent after that, neither Phosphophyllite nor Cinnabar saying a word as Y/N continued to fold the paper into something neither of the other two Gems really paid much attention to.
Cinnabar chose to help the slightly awkward Phos and pointed in a general direction off somewhere, "In that direction, I managed to find some plants that puff out smoke when you step near them. I don't know if those are great discoveries but they are new, I think."
"Yeah, they're new. Why do you speak like that?" finally Y/N spoke again after he was done folding the piece of paper into an... aeroplane? Well, neither of the three really knew what that was, Y/N learned to do this from Kongo-sensei and he was putting his countless hours of practice into work today, "You speak like the only thing that cares about you is you yourself."
Y/N stood up and finally his paper aeroplane with a few good strokes to make it extra rigid, "Tell you what, how about we change that?"
Cinnabar and Phos both raised an eyebrow at what Y/N was trying to say, but instead of answering he threw the paper aeroplane at Cinnabar. The paper construct flew rather flawlessly even in the slight winds present in the area before it bounced off of Cinnabar's forehead. As Cinnabar bent down to pick up the paper aeroplane Y/N gave Phos a thumbs up which confused her even more. Upon unfolding the plane Cinnabar stopped moving altogether which only served to confused Phosphophyllite further, but when she wanted to ask Y/N what was on the paper he just put a finger to his mouth, signing to her to be quiet.
"You always say that you want to be alone, well, tough luck, I'm not letting you be alone anymore. Hey Phos, guess what?" Phos stuttered for a second before recollecting herself.
"Um, what?" asked Phos, incredulously confused.
"You got yourself another assistant," Phos, much like Cinnabar just stood there, frozen.
Meanwhile, on the paper in Cinnabar's hands was something scribbled on in surprisingly bad handwriting that could only be recognized as Y/N's, on the paper was a crudely drawn picture of chibi Y/N, Cinnabar and Phos with the big title FRIENDS above them. There also appeared to be a sentence written on the bottom of the picture, "Wanna be friends?"
Cinnabar almost snorted were she not so shocked by the simple yet completely unexpected and bold strategy Y/N just used against her, she almost didn't notice the small text written under the already small text she read previously, "PS: You are not allowed to say no."
"A blade of grass is capable of recognising that you are lonely, and because you appear to be so versed in navigating these parts I thought it would be a good idea to ask for thy help, you're not allowed to say no," Phos nearly fell to the ground at the abrupt and stoic message at the end of Y/N's sentence, "Hey Shinsha, how long are you going to look at that? I know the picture's horrid and all but is it that bad?"
"...Yes," finally, after a few good seconds Cinnabar replied, Y/N arched an eyebrow though. What did she say yes to?
"Yes, what? Is the drawing bad or-"
"Just... yes," Cinnabar's reply just made Y/N blink before he shrugged, meanwhile, Phos was looking rather confused, again, her head was desperately trying to figure out what in the lustrous fuck just happened, "But... you said you'll find me a job that only I can do, and that it will be fun."
"Yes, I did, this is step one, step two involves finding and step three is profit," Y/N's casual explanation made Cinnabar sweatdrop a little before a small smile spread across her lips, she then folded the piece of paper she received from Y/N and put it in her pocket.
"I'm still not coming back to school," Cinnabar's statement was logical, after all, just because she was with Y/N and Phosphophyllite now didn't mean her poison magically disappeared. But, at least, she didn't have to be all alone now.
Y/N then handed their newest addition to the team a bunch of blank papers and his pen, "You are going to need these. Also, mind if I try something?"
Cinnabar quirked up an eyebrow while Phos felt a little bit left out of the conversation so she just returned to sketching some pictures on her clipboard while trying to ignore the conversation between the two red-haired individuals.
The male gem extended his hand out to Cinnabar which just confused her, he did nothing else, as if he was waiting for something, "What are you doing?"
"I want to test something out. Mercury 'poisons' us by damaging our bodies and seeping into the cracks, preventing light from coming through. Now, shake my hand," both Cinnabar's and Phosphophyllite's eyes shot open like saucers, with one thought going through both of their heads regarding Y/N's sudden request.
"Have you gone mental?!" an appropriate reaction by both of the lustrous Gems, but Y/N remained unfazed and kept his hand stretched out.
"Perhaps. Now, let the experiment commence. I want to see if Red Matter can counter mercury," while Y/N's reasons seemed purely scientific and for research purposes, Cinnabar could tell there was an ulterior motive behind his words, after all... this wasn't the first time he tried to do something like this.
"No... You've already tried this before Phos was born, Rutile had to chip away parts of your arms," Phosphophyllite's eyes widened noticeably and her mouth hanged open, she looked at Y/N for any form of confirmation, and when the male simply closed his eyes she got her answer. A voiceless yes.
"That was then, this is now. You understand how my body works, don't you? Maybe it won't be the same this time, maybe it will. You guys are always afraid of trying out new things despite having limitless time to do so. Maybe my body will harden so much in the future I won't be able to move, maybe it won't, we won't know until the time comes. So, let's experiment a little before that happens. I'll say it again, shake my hand," not a single word was said after what Y/N has said. Neither Phos nor Cinnabar really gave it much thought, but Y/N was a bigger outcast than even Cinnabar.
Y/N's body was different, that much everyone knew. His body changed and hardened as time passed on. He was already on Diamond's level of hardness, and would in time surpass even Bort. But, what would happen after that? Would his body harden so much he would become indestructible like their sensei? Would he even be able to function like them? Y/N's personality was the biggest contrast to everyone else, why the rest of the school's inhabitants fear Cinnabar, Y/N saw wasted potential and someone in desperate need of someone to talk with, laugh with, perhaps even despair with, but that was then, and this is now. Change takes time, and nobody brings change as Y/N does. That is who he is, the only one of them who not only changes himself but those around him. Whether that is a good or a bad thing nobody knows yet, but as it was previously stated, only time will tell.
"...Fine," with great reluctance Cinnabar extended her hand and placed it against Y/N's, concentrating as hard as she could to not spill even a single drop of mercury onto him. She prayed it wouldn't end like last time.
Phos looked on with bated breath as the two held hands, yet nothing was happening, thankfully. Cinnabar's eyes narrowed slightly as an imaginary bead of sweat trickled down her cheek, "Y/N, let go, now."
"Nope," Y/N understood why Cinnabar seemed panicked, she was losing control, or perhaps she didn't trust herself to be able to hold off the mercury. But, he wanted to give her hope that maybe, just maybe, she finally had someone she didn't have to be afraid of being around, "Relax. Being tense will-"
But Y/N didn't even get to finish his sentence as a glop of the poisonous silver liquid suddenly enveloped both of their hands.
"Y/N!" yelled the mint-haired Gem, her scream snapped Cinnabar out of her stupor as she quickly and forcefully retracted mercury-covered hand from Y/N who hardly reacted to his hand being enveloped by the liquid poison, "Y/N, are you okay?!"
"I'm fine," replied Y/N as he just gazed at his hand with an indifferent expression while Cinnabar took deep breaths to help calm herself.
The powder covering Y/N's hand was completely gone as the last bits of mercury fell onto the green grass and quickly turned its lush green colour into a ghastly brown one. Cinnabar reached for Y/N and tried to utter some words, some manner of apology but found herself mute as Y/N continued to just stare at his hand. If Y/N truly hasn't become immune to her poison, would he start to ignore her again? Despite having just become friends her mind couldn't fathom such thought. She just had someone to talk to again on a daily basis and was already on the path to losing that person.
"Hmm, it definitely feels different than Red Matter. I wonder..." both Cinnabar and Phos watched as Y/N's own counter-version of Cinnabar's poison coated his hand for a few short moments before it fell to the grass which was previously poisoned, turning its sickly brown colour back to bright green, "Would you look at that."
While Y/N's hand was completely lacking any powder, showing the red coloured lustrous material which laid beneath it to the world, it also didn't appear any different than normal. The light appeared to be passing through it perfectly fine.
"I-It worked...?" asked Phos after a short period of silence, completely amazed that someone was finally able to withstand Cinnabar's poison.
Cinnabar remained speechless as Y/N inspected his hand some more before shrugging and giving the red-haired female a smug look, "Told ya."
While Phos was fretting over how cool and dangerous that was what he just did Y/N simply waved it off as a worthwhile gamble, but Cinnabar hadn't uttered a single word, she just stared at her hands before looking at Y/N with wide eyes.
This time it was Y/N's turn to raise an eyebrow, "Surprised? I did say it might be different-"
-SLAM-
Y/N was suddenly tackled in the middle of his sentence by none other than Cinnabar whose actions startled both Y/N and Phos, while Y/N was expecting her to be happy he wasn't expecting something on this level, but smiled lightly as the red-haired female buried her face into his shoulder, holding her as if he would fade away any second now. Phos looked like she wanted to say something chose to remain quiet and let Cinnabar have her moment of happiness.
"Your welcome," was all Y/N said as he hugged Cinnabar back, "But don't coat me in mercury, Beryl is going to have my head if she finds out I ruined her magnum opus."
Phos laughed lightly while Cinnabar just remained quiet, her face still in Y/N's shoulder. She tackled him with such strength she nearly felt her body break, but luckily it didn't and she was finally, after a thousand or so years be allowed to touch someone without hurting them. So, for this moment, she allowed herself to laugh with Phos while Y/N just smiled before looking back, seeing the sun start to set behind the horizon. The male anomaly caused yet another change and everyone that would come to learn of it wouldn't dare call it a bad one.
[[TO BE CONTINUED...]]
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Braggski: Here it is, the long-awaited update. Apologies for the lack of said updates, I was ill and my mind was somehow a bigger bunch of nothing than it normally is. Anywho, I hope you enjoyed the interaction I have written between Y/N and Cinnabar, I know I basically changed a shit ton of stuff but the main objective of Phos and Y/N in terms of their new friend remains the same, find her a fun job only she can do. See ya next Friday, hopefully!