Author's Note: Thank you all so much for the incredible support! It genuinely blew my mind to see the story holding strong at fifteen stars. I'm experimenting with a slightly different narrative structure right now; if it's not your vibe, I can easily pivot back to the previous style without any issues. I also want to give a massive shout-out for the views—we've been consistently hitting between eighty and a hundred per chapter, which keeps me deeply motivated to push my limits and bring you fresh content.
Let's make a deal: if I see plenty of engagement in the comments and we clear over twenty stars, I'll drop a three-chapter mass release on the exact same day. I'll probably fry my brain staring at the PC screen for that long, but if we clear that milestone and there are solid suggestions in the comments, I might just weave them into the lore.
By the way, this specific chapter incorporates a reader recommendation, though injected with my own personal twist. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart for the love <3.
Chapter 23: Past, Present, and a Better Look
Steven stared back at the Gems with a thoroughly confused expression, arching a single skeptical eyebrow. They were apparently demanding a full underwater deployment or something along those lines. Amethyst was just standing there smirking, clearly finding the entire concept highly amusing.
"Right," Steven muttered, his shoulders dropping slightly. It was exceptionally early in the morning, and only Amethyst and Pearl were currently down in the kitchen organizing the final logistical details.
He shot them a thoroughly bewildered look. "So, let me get this straight—you want the three of us to execute a mission entirely by ourselves?" Pearl offered a highly rushed, affirmative nod, confirming the baseline objective. Garnet apparently wanted to evaluate how they operated in the field without her acting as an immediate safety net. Amethyst aggressively backed the play with an enthusiastic grin.
"So what's the move, old man? We dropping in or what?"
"Do I even have a choice here?" Steven shot back dryly.
"Nope!" Amethyst chirped with immense amusement. Before he could even brace himself, she hoisted him over her shoulder like a literal sack of potatoes and marched straight toward the warp pad.
"You know, I am perfectly capable of walking," Steven protested, his brow furrowing into a hard frown.
"I know!" Amethyst cackled, giving him a playful shake to emphasize the point.
Pearl simply shook her head, letting out a heavy sigh as she followed behind them with her signature elegant stride.
"Hey, can I at least get some breakfast first?!"
"No!" both Gems shouted in perfect, synchronized harmony.
Steven let out a thoroughly defeated sigh. The warp pad instantly engaged with a vibrant, high-frequency hum, enveloping the trio in a blinding pillar of light that shot them straight toward their next chaotic adventure.
The high-pitched hum of the warp beam rapidly dissolved, and the three figures materialized directly inside a breathtaking underwater landscape. Steven scanned the aquatic perimeter, watching tiny pockets of air bubbles lazily drift past his face as a faint, ethereal blue light filtered down from the distant surface.
Okay, this looks incredibly familiar, he thought, taking a mental inventory of the terrain.
"Welcome, Steven," Pearl announced, her tone shifting into that signature blend of ancient academic wisdom and high-tier theatrical drama. "Welcome to the Sea Shrine, a historic Gem monument built specifically to house the legendary Time Glass. That artifact is our primary objective today. This environment is exceptionally hazardous, so we must exercise absolute tactical caution. If we accidentally select the wrong chronometer from the massive archive housed here, it could dynamically trigger a lethal security matrix for anyone who isn't a full Gem. Frankly, given the sheer atmospheric pressure of this depth, even our physical forms could easily perish."
Amethyst crossed her arms, scanning the architecture with total indifference. "Basically, Steven, don't touch a single thing. Just sit back and let the big girls analyze which clock actually matters."
Steven didn't even bother responding. He was in a thoroughly garbage mood from the lack of breakfast, so he simply shooed them away with a dismissive wave of his hand.
"Go right ahead. I'm just going to walk around and keep my hands to myself."
With that, the three of them split up in entirely separate directions, their figures quickly dissolving into the deep blue shadows of the ancient sanctuary.
Steven strolled down the sprawling corridors of the shrine, noting that while the location had seemed entirely compact in the original show, the actual architecture felt massive in person. A smirk broke across his face as he thought to himself that the timeline had probably given the place a budget upgrade. He inspected the reinforced, heavy-duty glass panels keeping the structural grid stable under the crushing weight of the ocean, offering a spectacular, panoramic view of the deep-sea ecosystem outside.
I technically should be on high alert right now, he mused, keeping his hands shoved deep into his pockets. After all, Blue Diamond officially checked into the Earth sector. But honestly, the realization didn't even shock him anymore. He had actively perceived her inside that shared dreamscape; according to his memory of the canon lore, she frequently visited the specific coordinate where Pink Diamond's palanquin sat—the exact site of her supposed shattering. He kept his eyes peeled for traps while analyzing the data.
If I exposed my baseline signature in any way during that mental link, it would be an absolute textbook failure on my part, he muttered to himself. He could still vividly recall the crushing psychic pressure of that dream; if it hadn't been for his rapid-fire mental processing, his consciousness probably would have collapsed entirely. A faint smile played on his lips as he realized that if the original canon Steven had been tossed into that scenario, he wouldn't have survived three seconds. He was actively ascending to a completely superior tier of power, even if he still hadn't figured out the physics of flying.
He was abruptly pulled out of his tactical calculations when he stepped into a massive, towering rotunda. The chamber was significantly vaster than anything he remembered from the show, and the walls were completely lined with thousands of intricate, varied clocks.
"Whoa," he murmured, before shouting at the top of his lungs: "Hey! Girls! Found it! Get over here!"
A few consecutive seconds ticked by before the two Gems sprinted into the chamber.
"The other sectors were complete dead ends," Amethyst grumbled in frustration, aggressively scratching her head. "Seriously, Steven, your luck is borderline cheating."
Pearl nodded in firm agreement, her eyes rapidly scanning the archive with deep analytical focus. "Let us evaluate the options systematically. But please, under no circumstances touch anything. We do not want to drown down here, or worse, have our gemstones forcefully destabilized."
Amethyst felt a sudden shiver run down her spine and nodded frantically, and the three of them fanned out across the rotunda to inspect the artifacts.
"This one looks pretty solid," Amethyst noted, casually pointing at a random clock.
"Absolutely not," Pearl shot back firmly. "I distinctly recall the artifact being significantly more spherical and robust."
"Is it this one?" Steven asked, purely to keep up appearances as he pointed straight toward the largest, most glaringly obvious clock in the entire room.
"Oh, my sweet, naive Steven, you are simply too young to understand," Pearl said, giving his head a couple of patronizing pats.
Steven shot her a thoroughly deadpan look. "What does chronological age have to do with identifying an artifact?" he asked with genuine curiosity.
"You just don't know the layout," she replied flatly.
"And you do?" he countered, arching a single skeptical eyebrow.
An incredibly awkward silence blanketed the room as Pearl closed her eyes, freezing completely in place like a broken statue. Finally, she let out a tiny sigh and muttered under her breath, "It's round... and large."
"So, in short," Steven said with a sharp, mischievous grin, "you have absolutely no idea which one it is."
Amethyst completely lost her composure and exploded into a fit of roaring laughter, while Pearl's face flushed a deep, embarrassed crimson.
"Well! What if I don't?!" she huffed with a massive wave of faux indignation.
"Oh, come on," Steven said, scanning the shelf. "Look, this one's round, but it's completely microscopic," he noted, pointing out a tiny, minuscule watch.
The two Gems stared at the tiny object in absolute silence for a fraction of a second before breaking out into a laughter so violent Steven genuinely thought the sonic vibrations were going to crack the glass.
"Oh, please!" Amethyst wheezed through her mocking tone. "Do you honestly think the legendary Time Glass would be some tiny little piece of garbage like that? It would get lost in a couch cushion!" Pearl chimed in with a wide smirk. "You know what? It's definitely this one," Amethyst declared, casually grabbing the exact clock she had pointed out earlier, completely checked out of the reality that their laughter was preventing anyone from executing safe movements.
Pearl and Steven's expressions instantly went completely robotic.
"Son of a bitch," Amethyst muttered as the reality of her mistake sank in.
Out of nowhere, a deep, ominous rumbling that definitely didn't signal the arrival of birthday cake filled the entire cavern structure.
"Run, goddamn it!" I yelled at the top of my lungs, aggressively snatching the actual Hourglass of Time from its pedestal. Amethyst and Pearl grabbed whatever random clock happened to be within arm's reach and bolted for the exit. Shit, shit, shit, the three of us chanted in a fierce, chaotic loop as the structure began to cave.
"Should we try to fu—" Pearl screamed frantically, trying to coordinate a tactical fusion, but Steven cut her off with a desperate shout: "Don't even think about it, damn it! Just move your legs! Run, Forrest, run!"
The three of us hit the warp pad at the exact millisecond the entire sanctuary collapsed into the ocean depth. Well...
Back at the temple, Garnet calmly stepped out of her room, entirely convinced that even if the team failed the baseline objective, the kids would have the operational maturity to return empty-handed rather than cause a massive structural disaster. Then the four of them could execute a coordinated redeployment, giving her the perfect window to hold a civilized conversation with Steven. Everything was systematically mapped out. God, you are incredibly sharp, Garnet, she thought to herself with a highly satisfied smile.
Suddenly, the warp pad engaged with a violent flash.
"Huh?" she murmured softly.
With a massive, echoing CRACK, the literal entirety of the ocean volume evacuated from the warp beam and slammed straight into her face. I did not see this specific timeline coming, Garnet thought as an imaginary drop of cold sweat rolled down her visor.
The entire ocean water mass completely flooded the interior of the house, and amidst the floating furniture and absolute chaos, three disheveled figures materialized.
Steven was currently wedged upside down inside a structural pillar, his boots dangling in the air with a literal live fish stuffed in his mouth. Amethyst was holding a wild dolphin in her arms, staring at it with a look of total, unadulterated confusion. And Pearl... well, Pearl was frantically sprinting across the surface of the rising water while two angry crabs ruthlessly pinched her ankles without an ounce of mercy.
Garnet observed the entire spectacle in absolute, deadpan silence, completely baffled by the pure comedy routine playing out in front of her. "I am not even going to ask," she said dryly, maintaining her rigid composure while the three of us splashed around. "But... why?" she finally managed to utter, completely unable to process the logistics of the failure.
"A minor calculation error," I called down from my upside-down perch in the pillar. "Small operational variables." I stared down at the fish I was currently holding in my hands, which against all biological odds was actively still breathing. Without overthinking it, I hurled it straight through the open front door, letting it drop back into the actual sea... assuming it survived the fall. Garnet shot me a deeply confused look before snapping her gaze over to Pearl, expecting a full military debrief on what had just occurred.
Amethyst was actively screaming as a fresh batch of crabs pinched her without mercy. Garnet locked her with that signature, unyielding judgmental stare, prompting Amethyst—who was still clutching a random clock in her hand—to desperately justify her actions. "Look... okay!" she muttered, shrugging her shoulders as she wilted under Garnet's gaze. "We were holding a conversation and... I completely forgot what the primary objective was, alright? So I just snatched the first piece of hardware I could reach!"
Garnet remained completely silent for several consecutive seconds. The atmosphere turned so profoundly uncomfortable that even the crabs stopped pinching and went totally rigid. Finally, she let out a slow, controlled sigh and said with total calm: "You know what? Do whatever you want. I am leaving."
Without adding a single syllable, she turned on her heel and marched straight toward her room, but Steven caught a small, strange glint of light emanating from her gemstone right before the door closed. Then another. And before he could analyze the visual data, the stone door sealed shut entirely.
Steven blinked in total confusion. Wait, why did they just split apart inside the room? he thought, dropping his shoulders before pulling himself out of the column.
"Alright, since Amethyst engineered this disaster, she's the one cleaning it up. And before you even open your mouth," he added, locking her down with an incredibly serious stare, "make sure it's actually clean. Don't pull that garbage you do with your room." Amethyst opened her mouth to protest, but rapidly thought better of it and shut it without a word.
I gathered up the stray fish and crabs, which to Pearl's immense frustration didn't even attempt to pinch me, and instead happily hitched a ride on my shoulders. "Catch you guys later," I said with a smirk, quickly changing into a dry set of clothes and walking out the door with my new aquatic entourage.
Pearl glanced over at Amethyst. "I am going to assist you... but strictly just for today."
"Thanks," Amethyst managed, a genuinely grateful smile breaking across her face. "Seriously, thank you."
"Let's just... get this over with," Pearl murmured, shaking her head as she grabbed a mop.
Steven strolled down the beach, gently releasing the marine life back into the ocean surf. "See ya later, butterflies," he muttered, before freezing completely in place as the absolute absurdity of the phrase registered in his brain. "Wow," he whispered, aggressively shaking his head. "Maybe I should go get some fries. I haven't eaten a single thing today," he added, an anime sweat drop appearing as he rifled through his jacket pockets to see if he had enough cash to cover it.
"Oh, right," he said suddenly, his eyes locking onto the glowing temporal field of the Hourglass floating right by his side. He inspected the artifact for a few consecutive seconds, a highly mischievous, chaotic grin stretching across his face as he thought out loud. "Should I actually pull the trigger on this thing?" He stared at the sphere, deeply analytical. I run a high baseline risk of dying in a localized temporal paradox or warping into a parallel timeline... how did the ancient Gems even program the physics for this? No clue. Why did they build it? Also no clue.
He shifted his gaze down toward his own gemstone, speaking to it as if expects a direct response from the network. "What do you think, Mom? Do we warp to an alternate timeline, the past, or... wherever the hell this device decides to drop us? One flash for no, two flashes for yes."
"Obviously, it's gonna glow," he muttered, raising his voice. A flock of seagulls nearby stared at him with absolute stone-cold expressions as his gemstone suddenly emitted two distinct, consecutive flashes of pink light.
"Perfect!" he cackled with a borderline deranged laugh. "For science, damn it!" he shouted, violently activating the temporal matrix. "Take me to the future!" A blinding burst of light completely enveloped his entire physical form, and he vanished from the timeline.
And just like that, Steven took a blind gamble to catch a glimpse of his own future... or perhaps something significantly worse.
He materialized floating straight in mid-air. He blinked in total confusion, spinning around to scan the landscape. "Huh?" he muttered skeptically, rubbing his eyes to clear his vision. "What the hell is this...?" The terrain felt vaguely familiar. Wait a minute, this is the exact coordinate where I ran into that damn goat, he realized, a drop of cold sweat rolling down his cheek. "Incredible piece of hardware," he commented, looking down at the sphere as it flashed once before going completely dark.
"Roberta!" he shouted into the empty air. Wait... what the hell was that goat's name again? he thought, realizing he had completely wiped the data from his memory. "Well, she's a no-show," he muttered finally, casually strolling toward the warp pad. He took one final look at the horizon and warped out.
Not too far from that exact spot, a goat alongside several significantly larger goats blinked in absolute confusion before quietly returning to their grazing grounds.
Meanwhile, in this future timeline, Garnet was sitting in the living room, casually cycling through television channels with the remote. "Come on, girls," she said, utilizing her future vision to scan for something remotely engaging to watch. "Steven is currently outside hanging out with Connie... ever since the Diamonds pushed him past his absolute limit. Well, realistically speaking, the kid doesn't actually possess a psychological limit," Garnet sighed heavily. "We have reiterated it to him a thousand times: he is structurally human. But hey... they never actually listen to our data."
Pearl offered a slow, heavy nod of agreement. "The Diamonds are still operating under the delusion that, at some point, Steven is going to dynamically unlock Rose's core memories, as if she didn't permanently vacate her physical form... and as if they hadn't literally ripped his gemstone out of his body when he was younger."
All three Gems went completely rigid at the mere mention of that specific memory.
Amethyst was just about to chime in when the warp pad suddenly flared to life with an aggressive hum. "Are we expecting a deployment?" Pearl asked skeptically.
"Not at all," Amethyst grumbled, slightly annoyed by the disruption.
The warp beam dissolved, and a figure stepped out onto the pad.
"Steven?!" all three shouted in perfect, synchronized bewilderment.
I literally just arrived and I'm already facing three future iterations of the Gems, Steven thought, an anime sweat drop sliding down his temple. "Hey there," he greeted them with a casual smile. "I'm just here to retrieve a specific item and then I'll be out of your hair," he added, walking toward the bedroom stairs, noting that the interior layout had undergone some minor modifications—it looked exactly like the Future version of his room.
"Dude, aren't you supposed to be outside with Connie right now? And... why the hell did you shrink?" Amethyst asked, arching a highly skeptical eyebrow before a playful smirk broke across her face. "Though, honestly, the retro look suits you."
"Just running an errand," Steven repeated smoothly. "What's the matter, can't a guy experiment with shape-shifting anymore?" he joked, stepping out of the room. "Catch you later, girls," he said, waving a hand. But right at that exact millisecond...
The actual adult Steven materialized on the warp pad. "Hey girls, look, I don't think that whole marriage proposal matrix worked out, I should probably—" He cut himself off mid-sentence, freezing completely solid as his eyes locked onto a significantly younger version of himself standing in the living room.
Young Steven stared straight back at him, his expression completely blank. "What the hell are you looking at, dude?" he said dryly, while his adult self stared at him as if he were looking at a literal mirage.
"Are you... are you me?" the older Steven asked, completely unable to process the data.
"Nope, I'm Batman," the younger version shot back with a highly mischievous grin.
The silence in the room turned so incredibly thick you could actively hear the electrical hum of the warp pad.
...
...
...
???
???
???
"Batman?!" adult Steven repeated, looking thoroughly losing his mind.
"You're me, just older," the kid said, feigning absolute innocence while pointing a finger at him.
"How are you even physically present here, kid?" the older Steven asked, his internal processor rapidly calculating the cause. "Don't tell me you..."
"Because of this," the young variant interrupted with a smug little chuckle, hoisting the Hourglass of Time directly in front of his face.
"That clock..." adult Steven muttered, his face twisting into a grimace of terrible memories. "That artifact belongs to my personal timeline, so you are absolutely not keeping it."
I literally stuck my tongue out at him in response, completely triumphant.
Adult Steven just stared at him, letting out a heavy sigh of absolute resignation.
"Alright," the kid finally declared, breaking the tension. "I guess this is structurally confusing. How about you go by 'Future Steven,' and I'll take the title of 'Handsome Steven.' Sound fair?"
"Huh?!" Future Steven muttered, two massive drops of sweat rolling down the back of his neck.
"I mean, I'm visibly handsome, don't you think? You look entirely out of shape," Handsome Steven commented with a sharp, wicked smirk.
"What the hell happened to my metabolism in that timeline?!" Future Steven yelled, his face a portrait of absolute, unadulterated disbelief.
Amethyst stepped into the conversation, arching an eyebrow. "Yo, old man, what were you about to tell us regarding Connie anyway? Spill the tea, I want the gossip."
"Oh, right..." Future Steven sighed, lowering his gaze, while young Handsome Steven stood right next to him with three literal anime anger veins floating over his forehead. "Connie rejected the proposal. She says we're way too young," he explained with a completely defeated sigh.
The Gems instantly rallied to offer him emotional validation, while I just stood there looking at him with a stone-cold expression.
"What a total load of shit," I blurted out flatly.
Everyone in the room instantly whipped their heads toward me as if I had just combed my hair with a radioactive wave while glowing neon lights flashed in the background. "What?"
"Watch your language, young man!" Pearl gasped with a frantic, nervous little chuckle.
Handsome Steven let out a heavy sigh. "Honestly... I'm out of here. You guys can suck it," he muttered dryly, violently engaging the Hourglass matrix and vanishing into another temporal pocket.
Adult Steven just stared at the empty space. "...What?" he managed to whisper, his brain completely short-circuiting.
Steven materialized in an entirely unmapped coordinate. "The beach," he murmured skeptically, calmly analyzing his surroundings. He instantly picked up on a glaring structural anomaly. The house doesn't exist. He placed a thoughtful hand against his chin and smiled. "Elemental, my dear Gem, elemental."
He turned around with deep curiosity and spotted a perimeter fence in the distance. "Interesting," he noted, deeply intrigued as he walked toward the coordinates where the temple structure should have been. "How gorgeous," he commented, inspecting the scenery. If his archival data didn't fail him, the environment looked significantly more pristine than his own timeline. The terrain, the cave structure, the baseline architecture. This actually looks way better than my house, he thought, slightly stunned.
He marched right up to the temple door, deciding to test the interface. If I can seamlessly interface with this network... interesting. He approached the stone panel, and with a brilliant flash of pink energy, he attempted to override the lock. To his genuine surprise, the door slid open without a single shred of resistance.
Without saying a word, he calmly stepped inside the room. Out of nowhere, a highly familiar silhouette materialized: a pristine Rose Quartz, though it was merely the default cloud-matrix variant he had programmed into his own room. "Wow," he said, resting a hand against his chin. "It looks like my baseline configurations carry over across timelines. But honestly, I'd better wipe this entity from the grid before I confuse myself."
He proceeded to delete the manifestation, but right before the script finalized, a completely different, yet hauntingly familiar voice resonated directly behind his back.
"Who are you?"
That voice... Steven's entire posture went completely serious. He calmly turned around toward the source of the audio and there she was.
"Hey, Mommy," he said, a confident smile breaking across his face.
"Huh?" she responded, her face a portrait of absolute, unadulterated shock. It was the actual Rose Quartz. She possessed that towering, curly pink hair, as breathtakingly beautiful as her rounded yet hyper-delicate facial features, radiating absolute purity and natural elegance. She was wearing her iconic, flowing white gown. What does this specific cosmic variable mean? Steven thought, analyzing his past mother.
"Who are you?" Rose demanded rapidly, quickly recovering her composure. "You should not possess the clearance required to access this sanctuary."
"And why wouldn't I?" he responded with absolute tranquility. This was the literal first time he was holding a face-to-face conversation with someone he had genuinely wanted to analyze. He smoothly hoisted his shirt, revealing his pink gemstone.
"You're... a Quartz," Rose muttered, completely lost in architectural confusion.
"Not a Quartz," Steven corrected her, snapping his gaze upward to lock eyes with her directly. "A Diamond."
An absolute, crushing silence flooded the entire chamber.
"Who are you?" Rose asked again, her tone dropping into a dangerous, hyper-serious register.
"I'm your son. Well, technically not the one you're about to give birth to in your current trajectory. Let's just say I'm a specialized variant engineered by your choices. I am the entity who, if you play your cards factually right, is going to systematically clean up the absolute disasters you left behind during your ridiculously long lifespan." He looked up at his mother with a weary, nostalgic smile. "I am your lineage, your next of kin. Let's call me a creation without an initial blueprint. I am you, but simultaneously entirely separate. I am someone completely new thanks to your existence. Someone who possesses the capability, and will execute the fix. I am going to clean up your mess."
Rose went entirely rigid, but the way she analyzed his physical framework completely shifted. "You utilized the Hourglass of Time, didn't you?"
"Precisely," he responded with a wide smirk. "Look at you, exceptionally intelligent. One point for team Homeworld," he added with a highly mocking undertone.
"So... you possess my gemstone?" Rose asked, her eyes drifting down toward his abdomen. "You know, I've been running extensive biological research regarding the human anatomy," Rose noted, resting a hand against her chin. Wow, Steven thought, genuinely surprised, the canon show completely skipped over that specific detail.
"So you're saying you're a definitive choice of mine?" Rose inquired.
Steven simply nodded his head in confirmation while seamlessly commanding the room to manifest a high-end wooden table, two chairs, and a pair of freshly brewed teacups.
"You possess immense operational experience with this interface," Rose commented, pulling herself out of her thoughts.
"Thank you," Steven replied with a smirk. "Pure, unadulterated experience. But let me tell you, breaching this room wasn't exactly a walk in the park. I literally had to threaten to structurally atomize the door before the mainframe let me inside."
Rose stared at him through a completely redefined lens. "So... as the humans classify it... a son? You are my son. And if my research serves me correctly, well, I require a male specimen for that equation, correct?"
Steven just stared back at her with a total "what the hell are you talking about" expression. Wow... he thought, trying to visualize the logistics of his own cosmic birth. "Look... if you happen to run into a short human with long hair and an exceptionally high-tier taste in music, that guy is your definitive key."
Rose analyzed the data in absolute silence.
"Oh, right," Steven added with complete nonchalance. "You need to attend a localized rock concert. If you don't know what that is, look up the files. Don't look at me for answers, you're the one who wants a male specimen." He gave a casual wave of his hand in dismissal.
Rose just stared at him, completely bewildered by the instructions.
"Well," she finally said, clearing her throat. "Do you require anything from me?"
"Just one question," Steven responded, glancing down at his own stomach. "Look, I didn't drop into this timeline on purpose. I simply commanded the Hourglass to warp me to a random coordinate. A few minutes ago, I caught a glimpse of an alternate future timeline, and frankly, I thoroughly hated it. But getting back to the primary topic... I know I've got high-tier potential. I just have one massive technical question."
"Of course, ask away," Rose said with total calm.
"How the hell do you fly? My power grid is completely tethered to my emotional spectrum, but I have tried absolutely every single physical layout to trigger levitation and I've got nothing."
Rose locked onto him with a serene, ancient expression—the look of an entity who had lived through multiple eons of cosmic warfare.
"To be completely candid with you, my core emotions are the definitive key to that matrix. If you haven't successfully achieved flight yet, it simply translates to the fact that your system isn't operationally ready. I may or may not have left a series of biological checkpoints for you to unlock via high-intensity training, a severe emotional spike, or simply a random calculation. So, realistically, you possess multiple pathways."
Steven sat completely frozen in his chair, three anime anger lines popping up on his forehead. "So, in short, I am completely dependent on RNG luck."
"Basically, yes," Rose replied, a massive, ear-to-ear grin breaking across her face.
"Fantastic, my hands are completely tied," Steven sighed in resignation. "It was a genuine pleasure meeting you, Mother. I really don't want to form a psychological attachment here and then refuse to return to my proper timeline. But hey, if you ever need a tactical asset from my sector... just look for the Hourglass of Time." He hoisted the device up, flashing her a sharp smile. "It's this specific model, accept no substitutes. So yeah," he said, stepping around the table.
Without adding another word, he pulled her into a firm embrace. Rose went completely rigid at first, but the absolute second she realized how much her future son genuinely required that physical validation, she simply went quiet, melting into the hug and wrapping her arms around him.
"Thank you," Steven murmured softly. "I seriously needed that." As they broke the embrace, Rose fully noticed the tears silently streaming down her future son's cheeks.
"Well," Steven said, quickly wiping his eyes. "Time to head back to my proper era. I don't want to get dynamically erased by the timeline matrix." He began walking toward the exit, and Rose silently followed directly behind his stride. The two of them stepped through the temple threshold and walked out onto the pristine shoreline.
Steven spun around to face her one last time. "You know, Mom, actually seeing you in a physical capacity was an incredible experience. Imagining your baseline profile isn't the same as actually perceiving your presence." A massive, nostalgic smile broke across his face. "I highly hope I live up to your expectations." He raised the Hourglass of Time, looking at her one final time. "Any closing remarks, Mother?"
Rose remained entirely silent for a few lingering seconds before her face illuminated with a breathtaking, radiant smile. "I love you."
"I know," I muttered under my breath, as a single, treacherous tear rolled down my cheek and my entire physical structure began to dissolve into a soft, pink digital glow.
Rose stared at the empty space where her future son had been standing a millisecond ago. "It appears I have a significant amount of preparation to execute," she murmured with a wide smile. "I need to map out these logistics well in advance." With that, she turned and calmly walked back toward her room.
And just like that, completely oblivious to the cosmic irony, Steven had traveled back to rewrite his very own past. A past where, if he hadn't personally intervened to drop those tactical hints, he simply wouldn't have been born in the first place.
Author's Note: You might be scratching your head wondering why Steven didn't warp straight into his definitive future. Well, it's because that future hasn't actively been written yet. He is simultaneously the past, the present, and the impending future. There is no predetermined future... because he is the one actively forging it. A little mind-bending, right? Thank you all so much for the incredible support. If we clear around twenty stars, I'll grind out the next chapter as fast as humanly possible!
End of Chapter 23.