Summary: A trip down memory lane
Marco watched as the two butterfly siblings trained in their own way. Star tried out spells in her book, and Stelly focused on 'being relaxed' through the art of meditation, something Marco personally enjoyed explaining.
"Now to begin, just start by focusing on your breathing." Marco explained as he sat across from the fusion. "It's all about having a clear mind when processing all your thoughts, and considering it's two, technically three people here, that's going to take a minute."
"Don't worry Marco, we've totally got this." He quickly realized, dealing with the fusion, that it was less of a 'hyper violent' problem and more of an inferiority superiority complex, but the meditation would be good for them either way. "Just focus on how I breath and relax … in the moment …"
"Narwhal blast!" The moment was not a quiet one due to Star yelling her spells.
"Star, do you mind?" Stelly rolled their eyes. "I'm trying to focus here."
"Well yes, because you're the ones in my room." She pointed to the space before her. "Why did you decide to do it here anyway?"
"Biggest space and most repairable stuff." Marco deadpanned.
"And Steven feels comfortable when he's doing this stuff next to you." Stelly explained. "Kelly would rather do it in an empty wrestling ring, but this was closer."
"Mmm." Star gave an uncharacteristic hum as she stared at the fusion, before looking at her Narwhals. "Still can't get it right. This fritz sucks."
"Hey, you've been able to use the gem powers fine, better than Steven has been doing in a while." Stelly responded. "Just how much of Steven's power can I use like this? Do I still have the shield?" A quick pink flash proved they in fact did. "Yay, the sword and shield team are still in action!"
"Yeah, yeah, you're so great.." Star trailed off to the side before groaning. "Narwhal blas..Ahhhhhhh!" Instead of usual Narwhals, fleshy globs of green guts and entrails came out instead. "Aaaah!"
" Kill….me." The pile of flesh moaned.
"Star…that is so messed up!" Marco shouted as he headed to the window and threw up to empty his breakfast.
"I think it might be getting worse." Stelly observed, idly poking at the thing.
Star let out a growl, opening the pages of the book. "Glossaryck, I know we're trying to fix this, but I don't think it's doing anything."
"Of course it's doing something." The blue man spoke. "It's making a mess."
"No doi. It's coming out goopier than usual." Star said with an eye roll. "Please tell me there's something we can do about the fritz."
"Not directly, but we can get rid of what's contaminating your wand."
"Metaphorically or literally?" Stelly asked with a raised eyebrow.
"A bit of both, but more of the latter." Glosseryck went on. "The wand in essence is an extension of the user's mind, and right now, there's something within the memories that shouldn't belong there." He looked at the two siblings. "And due to the bond between you two, there's two sets of memories to forge through."
"Alright." Marco said. "I'll pack and-"
"Nope nope nope nope-" The man created a new hand with each 'nope'. "The more people there the more dangerous it is, literally the exact opposite of the wild wild survival guide. Just two, no more, no less."
"Yeah, just a solo Star and Steven adventure, just like the good old days!" Star raised a fist in the air. "Which means no third wheels or unnecessary fusions…so if you would…" Star made a splitting motion with her hands. "Splitity-split split."
"Right right." The fusion scoffed. Then frowned, then looked sweaty as they glowed, before stopping. "Just a sec." They looked deep in concentration, two bodies starting to form slower, before they eventually became two people again.
"Kelly, you better not be trying to hold my brother hostage, especially after what we just went through with Sardonyx." Star glared at the woolet, slightly more hostile than Marco expected.
"No, it's just …" Kelly looked tired. "Stelly sorta sticks like glue … harder to split than it is to merge."
"It's alright, that's what meditation is for." Steven patted the girl on the shoulder, who gave a slight blush in response. "Okay, I'm ready. It's just going through memories, so is it going to be a 'where's Waldo' type of thing?"
"Hang on." Marco waved his hands. "Before we do this, you're all knowing, and despite being an asshole, you actually care about Star and Steven … So what's the catch?" There has to be a reason he didn't suggest this to begin with.
"Two things of note. One, it was decreed by Queen Moon the Undaunted that neither of them were to ever enter the wand under any circumstances." Glossryck answered. "While I respect her as a past user, I follow whoever owns the spellbook, and Star's going to find a way to enter one way or another even if I refuse."
"You got that right, buddy." Star smirked. "Star the Underestimated here says she's ready to get on this ride with her bro."
"And two … while you're inside of your memories your new ones become old ones in a form of paradox that slowly overrides each other. Best case scenario, you find it and leave in a snap." Glossaryck snapped.
"Worst case?" Kelly asked.
"Well Star and Steven will technically cease to exist, but the ones that come out with will be indistinguishable in every way, soul and cell." That was so much existential horror said in one sentence that Marco and Kelly had no other choice but to tackle the two siblings in a hug.
"Guys, seriously, think this through!" Marco called out to them. "I don't want to be constantly thinking every second of every day if I lost two of the best friends I've made in my life."
"If we don't do anything, we're just going to keep messing up our magic, and then we'll all end up getting hurt, or kidnapped, or worse." Star reasoned. "And it's not like I'm going in alone, I have Steven coming along with me.
"And as long as we're together, nothing can go wrong." Steven said with so much conviction he was inclined to believe it.
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"'Nothing can go wrong' my ass." Star grumbles, picking up Marco's hoodie from his locker. That obviously didn't belong inside of her wand. "I look away for one second to admire catching Marco embarrassing himself, and suddenly I'm at school."
"It can't be that bad, especially from what I pick up from what Jana tells me." Steven followed right behind her, the both of them agreeing to hold hands to prevent separation. "Then again, she's the one making stink bombs in science class, so I might need a second opinion.
"Science class, that definitely doesn't belong in my wand." But like the school, it would be hard to carry out.
"Star, I think you're taking the 'what doesn't belong' thing too literally." Steven deadpanned. "It's not in your wand, it's in your brain."
"Well, then my brain is stupid for thinking about school so much. You get one C in math one time, and suddenly every teacher expects you to be the school genius." Star groaned, heading towards the cafeteria, where she could at least remember the food and get a chance to eat it.
"Why is it always math with you?" Steven asked. "Is it because you want to be like Justin?"
"Nah, I just like the kitties."
"Exactly what I sai … what she sai …" The two stopped walking, turning to see another pair of Star and Steven holding hands. Oh corn, it was the past versions of them! "Hey there." Star waved tentatively. "Did we find it yet?"
"Well, we're the versions of you from five minutes ago, so we haven't caught up with your timeline yet." The past Star replied back.
"Don't worry about it, soon we'll catch up to you and then overwrite your timeline, where you can spend the rest of eternity with the rest of us!" The past Steven said with a cheery tone that just got under her skin, "At least until the version that gets out passes on the wand, in which case, you'll cease forever!"
"I see … in that case … run!" Star gripped Steven tightly as she began running from the past versions of them.
"It's already happening, we're colliding, and our exit is gone!" Steven shouted. "GLOSSARYCK, GET YOUR TINY BUTT OUT HERE RIGHT NOW!"
"GLOSSARYCK, GET YOUR TINY BUTT OUT HERE RIGHT NOW!" They turned right behind them, and sure enough, there were about a dozen or so versions of herself and her brother running right behind them!
"Quick, we need cover!" Star tried to look for anything. "The science lab has locks!" She ran into the room, closing it behind her with a lock, holding onto the door with both hands. "Alright, completely covered." She smiled. "Isn't that right Ste-"
She was at the Big Donut … alone. "Oh nononono." Her brother was alone, somewhere, and she was here! She needed to go out there and find him! "What do I do, what do I do!? I can't outrun them on my own like this!"
"Baaaagh. " A noise sounded out loud from right behind her. Taking a slow turn of the head, she saw what looked like one of the pig-goat's from Mewni's farm stables, with a pink name tag on its neck, sitting what looked like her Dad's favorite rocking chair.
"What are you doing here?" She looked at the name tag. " Lil' Chauncey' ? My mom's pet Little Chauncy?" She never took the woman for a pig-goat lover, but she was oddly fond of Quartz Jr. whenever Steven took him home.
"Baaagh." The goat rubbed its head across her hand.
"Aww, aren't you just the cutest thing?" She smiled, petting the guy.
"What are you doing here?" And they were back, great, cause why not!?
"Ride like the wind, Lil Chauncey! We got a Steven to save!" Hopefully the real one! "Giddy up!" She hopped onto the Pig-Goat and thrusted his horns forward, years of riding Lion and warnicorns giving her plenty of experience controlling the animal.
"We got a Steven to save! " The probably hundreds of hers said from right behind her, and Star couldn't risk looking back, in fear of losing focus and getting lost amongst the past.
"Go away, get your own timeline to invade!" At least it was just hers, if it was both her and multiple versions of her brother than she might have…
" Stop." Star suddenly found herself freezing in place as what looked like her brother, except in that weird pink state he went into sometimes sticking out a hand, making the goat, as well as every other past version of herself stop.
"Steven, are you okay?" Every Star, including her, asked in concern.
"Go away." The cold voice of what appeared to be her brother said to the multiple Stars, as it sent a shockwave of complete devastation that ripped the very ground they were standing on.
"... Steven, when did you learn to do that?" Star asked tentatively.
The pink version of her brother turned to her, before pointing at a castle in the distance, her castle. "Go there." He spoke emotionlessly.
"You're not my Steven, are you?" She tried to reach out, only for the pink boy to form a sudden blocky dome around himself, completed with spikes surrounding it.
"I am what I need to be." The Pink Steven began walking towards the ruined field right before them. "So noisy."
"...Okay, I'll just get going then…moody." Star groaned, patting Lil Chaunchy's behind to get going. At least this version of her brother was somewhat as helpful as the real deal.
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Bill Dewey, the Mayor of Beech Creek, was on the edge of his ropes! The town as of late was a complete disaster, their tourist trap singer left, monsters and mutants came out of the woodworks, and giant hands from the sky! So many things were getting out of hand, and the one thing that a town in panic did in times of crisis was to blame the people on top, aka, HIM!
So he set up this play, a little event for the children of the town to put up and get together with, adding funding about the creation of Beach Creek and the unity it brought to the people. Sure his last couple of ideas fell flat … such as the ice cream. Why did nobody warn him it could be set on fire!?
It was completely perfect too! Not only would the town have a change to relax and forget about all the stressful events within the past few months, it would show off the amazing history of their town, as well as remind the great people of this city of his ancestry, and realize that the Dewey name was the only name that should stay in office.
He felt a stare, turning to see that Onion kid … staring at him with the eyes of one who has seen hell and laughed … he prayed for Yellowtail and Vidalia for having to deal with that. At least the rest of the children were excitedly singing on stage. The perfect day with the perfect plan. "The Dewey family name is trash!" Or it would be if it wasn't for some girl jumping out of the vents and onto the stage.
"This play is filled with nothing but lies and propaganda! The real life Captain Dewey was a coward that barely knew how to float in a bathtub, let alone in a sailboat!" The audience went aghast at the very notion of that little known fact he's tried to hide for years.
"Now hang on just a minute!" Dewey went onto stage. "Are you really going to ruin the sweet little play these four year olds are putting on, here and now? When they've been putting in the work for a whole month?" Take the bait.
"... Hey kids, want to learn how to summon Casper? I can teach you after I tell them the truth."
"Yay! Friendly Ghost Summoning!" Damn you, childlike innocence!
"Now as I was saying, if you want to know what actually happened, then I can tell you all right now what happened, from the words of Buddy Budwick himself, the first mate of Captain Dewey, who wrote the entire thing in this journal right here!" The girl in the green cap said, holding up an old worn out book.
"What that..where the heck did you find that?!" Mayor Dewey shouted.
"It's the one time going to the local library ever paid off for anybody." The hooligan girl sent a mischievous smirk before turning to the audience. "Captain Dewey was a clumsy fool who broke his own sail in the middle of trying to head back to wherever he came from. He only survived due to a 'Giant Gem Woman', who scooped his boat of the water when he was about to sink!"
"Giant gem woman? Like those girls from the beach!?" The boy who worked at the Big Donut shouted.
"The exact same ones! Images matchup as well!" She grinned the devil's grin. "I talked with them and got confirmation, confirming the man couldn't do anything himself, only having the honor of naming this town after he fell into two separate bodies of water!"
A girl with a blue streak in her hair laughed. "What a moron!" No, he was being ruined!
"Yep, he barely gave his own first mate a second's thought, and Buddy Budwick actually traveled the entire world in the aftermath!" The hooligan showed off very pages from the text. "The very first official documentation of alien life on the planet, as well as human's first interaction with magic!"
"Alien life!" "Magic forever!" The two town bloggers shouted at the top of their lungs, the crowd wild.
"Preach the truth!" Now his own SON was against him!
"This is our truth, the mayor is a descendant of a liar, failure, and coward!" She pointed to him. "For shame!!"
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After getting lost with Star, Steven found himself in … a crystal cave of sorts. "Okay, either this entire place doesn't belong …" He glanced at a glass image, seeing a reflection of a young Mr Universe. "Or this is the memories of the gem." Just like what happened with the time monitor.
"Okay Rose, show me what you got." He pressed his hand on one of the glass images, finding himself actually falling in it. "New and freaky. So weird." Steven looked at the sight right before him. He was in some sort of glass dome…in space.
"You know, gems being aliens is a thing I somehow memorized, but keep forgetting the implications of." He muttered, looking out at the image of earth in front of him. "So I guess that Ronaldo guy was right, and they really did fake the moon landing if they never found this." He should probably still correct the guy about the sneaple thing. Mewmans already got the wrong idea about monsters, he didn't want that to spread to earth too.
"Ugh…so boring." Steven watched as a tall pink figure, in some kind of tutu outfit entered the room and idly sat down on the chair. "I didn't think making a colony would mean just watching star dust as everyone else did the work."
Steven blinked in confusion, looking around. He never noticed Rose around here, just her, so who was- "Well that's how it is for someone of your caliber, my Diamond." He turned to the VERY familiar voice, only to see a flash of white move around the corner of the chair. Steven ran to chase it … and now found himself in a garden.
"A space Garden…of course." Steven looked around. It was actually very pretty, like the Garden he and Star played hide and seek back on Mewni. Ironically, he usually chose the rose bush to hide in. "It doesn't look like too much is happening here at least."
"YOU CAME BACK!" A squeaky voice entered from behind and tackled him, long noodly arms wrapping around his torso. "Oh Pink, it's been a hundred years since you last came, a lot sooner than the two hundred you took last time."
"A hundred what?" He looked at the strange person hugging him, a heart shaped gem in her chest. "I, I think you have the wrong person. I'm Steven." He told the gem.
"Hahaha, you haven't lost your sense of humor, Pink! Ste-ven. Ste-Von. Hah, who else but you can come up with such fun sounding words!" The gem that resembled one of those black and white cartoons Marco showed him giggled. "So watcha want to play today?! Juggling, Hide and seek, bop the aquamarine till it poofs?"
"I'm actually …" He wondered if he should even try talking sense into her. "I'm actually on a scavenger hunt." He decided. "I'm looking for what doesn't belong."
"Ooh! A secret mission! Like the one's Blue sends you on whenever she starts talking business junk on colonization or whatever." The heart-shaped gem laughed while sticking out her tongue. "Well, you didn't hear it from me, but I occasionally hear humming from beyond that pillar right over there." The gem stretched her arm out one that was about twenty feet away while shaping her hand like an arrow. "No one else but me is supposed to be here, so I find that mighty suspicious."
"Thanks." He smiled, walking around the pillar to the sound of humming-and now finding himself in a room as a humming version of … Rose, his mom, cradled a crying little girl.
"It's alright … you're going to be okay …"
"But mommy … she hurt Globgore …" A green haired girl in dark clothing had her head buried into the pink woman's hair. "He was just being nice, I invited him into my room, why can't she see he's a sweet guy."
"Your mom's just a little confused…very…very confused." Rose kept patting the girls back. "She lost her mommy too when she was barely older than you. She just lets her desire to protect her loved one's get the best of her at times." She lifted the girl's face up, revealing cheeks with spade marks on them. "Don't doubt for a second your mommy doesn't love you, Eclipsa."
… His birth mother was comforting his alternate dimension adopted mother … the queen of darkness … because why not? "What else is there in here?"
"I dunno, I just got here myself." Oh, a Steven caught up, lovely. "Well all I need to do is see this memory and…" The past Steven was covered in a bubble, and thrown out of the window…by the Rose memory.
"....How much do you…?" Steven asked the memory of his mom.
"I barely have a grasp of what I am inside of the wand. All I know is that you shouldn't be here." The rose memory responded to him.
"Just point me to Star, we can work it out from there." He pleaded with the woman.
"Okay. Just hold still for just a second." His mom tapped his forehead…and suddenly Steven felt himself being thrown at a hundred miles an hour, barely able to comprehend the world around him.
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Glossaryck was able to hide himself within tapestry, but couldn't manifest himself quite yet as Star burst her way through the door on Chancy. The old loyal Pig-Goat still had it in her apparently. "The Grandma room. Little Chauncy, why would you bring me here? I'm pretty sure this belongs in my memories. I used to go in here with Steven all the time."
"Baaaagggh." Chancy explained exactly what she needed to do.
"Of course you wouldn't be any help." No, you just refused to learn goat. "I'm lost in my wand with no way out, and my brother is missing!" Star shouted. "What would you do, oh queens of old!?" She asked.
The room lit up, pedestals rising. "Huh, this is new." She looked at the first one that appeared. " Celena the Shy. What hides behind the golden fan, the hand does sweetly hold, a trove of cosmic secrets that will never be told." She looked up at the picture of the very meek Queen. "Is one of those secrets why the heck I'm stuck here?" Probably not, a lot of people just assumed so much about Celena when she was just a quiet girl.
"Come on, there has to be something here." Star looked at the paintings of Solaria and Ecilpsa, only briefly passing by their texts. "I'm half certain history got wrong who the evil one between those two were." Star rolled her eyes, before coming across one of the paintings that was still hidden. "What's this now?"
Star pulled the curtain, revealing a pink figure. "Rose?" She asked, looking at the picture. A block of text glowed. "Never a queen, never a Butterfly, nonetheless Rose protected us with her shield. And when times grew dark and hate grew strong, she made sure all living things would be healed." The princess looked up. "So …" The small gem on the image sparkled, before Steven launched himself out of the painting and into Star, as they both crashed.
"Ouch … could have been more specific with-" The boy looked at his sister. "Star!"
"Steven!" She smiled. "You're not a memory, right!?"
"No, a memory of Rose pushed me here before they could catch up to me."
"Weird, I got pushed here by a pink you …" She looked around. "The room is a lot more lively than it was in the real world."
"Yeah, never knew it had glowing pedestals." It didn't. "Is that Chancy!?"
"Yep, found mom's pig-goat. Lively little fella." Star pet the creature.
"If Mom's pig-goat is here, then that means her tapestry is here too."
"Yeah, check it out, she's posing in front of …" Star trailed off, looking at the creature Moon was fighting.
"Toffee …" Steven muttered, looking at the glowing text. "The immortal monster will forever be haunted by the darkest spell of Moon the Undaunted."
"She blasted off his finger!" Star shouted. "She knew!!" The girl groaned! "How many secrets is that woman going to hide from us!? I'm getting really sick of it by this point!"
"I just went through Rose's old memories, and I still don't understand half the person she was. By now, I'm just feeling numb to it all." The boy looked around. "Hey look, this text doesn't even have a tapestry to go with it." Steven pointed to an empty space where Star's tapestry had yet to be displayed.
"Come together, will two little stars, One from Mewni, another from afar. Be they foe, or be they friend, Beside each other until the end. Either darkness will cease. Or nothing will ever know peace, but on that day there will be a sight. That will bring about darkness or the light."
"Star the Underestimated.." Star read the title above the text.
"It's as good of a name as any." Steven shrugged. "Hey, check it out, it's Glossaryck."
The being himself was able to leave the painting, breathing in exhaustion. "Do you … comprehend how … difficult that was?"
"We almost got erased from existence, so yeah, we can understand just a little bit." The prince groaned.
He dusted himself off. "Then we're out of time. Come on you both, into my eyehole."
"Wait, we still never found what didn't belo…" A ripping sound was heard from the Moon's painting…where Toffee's missing finger fell to the ground. "His finger! That's what doesn't belong!"
"His finger! That's what doesn't belong!" An army of Stars shouted, accompanied by Stevens. They were very close to the maximum limit here.
"Let's go for it!" Star grabbed her brother and jumped right in the middle!
"Let's go for it!" Glosssarcyk floated, extending his eye and bagging the two.
They arrived in Star's bedroom, rolling into the human and woolets.
"How come our recent visits have become so violent lately?" Tad asked.
"Because life just keeps getting more weird and wild." Steven sighed, looking at the dismembered finger of Toffee. "Has this been inside the wand since mom had it?" He picked it up in a bubble, that for once wasn't green.
"I don't know, and for the rest of today, I don't care." Star sighed as she grabbed the bubble and walked to the closet. "Syonarya, lizard man, don't come back."
"So since the bubbles are normal … did it work?" Kelly asked.
"Let's see. Narwhal blast!" The narwhal that came out was still green, but it wasn't the abomination of guts that they were last time. "Halfway good is good enough for now."
"So they came out without a scratch?" Marco asked him. Glossaryck just gave a cryptic smile as he floated to his book. "... The biggest asshole in the multiverse."