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shinneth · 5 years

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The Gem Ascension Reference Tour 3: WWE/General Wrestling

Let’s get by far the biggest reference in GA out of the way.

Most people who’ve reviewed or talked to me about GA have never failed to bring up the hilarity of the Ruby Math scene. Where Ruby, damaged and isolated from all of her friends and spouse, was faced with hundreds of Era 2 Peridots that all claimed to be Facet-2F5L Cut-5XG. None of them were. Ruby was certain of that.

Even though Ruby wasn’t in the least bit of danger because Peridots are notorious for being sucky fighters without the limb enhancers (which they all had to go without to give off the illusion they’re the great and lovable edition), she was still faced with a very difficult task of getting all of these low-caste gems poofed and bubbled to Earth, since it was apparent by this point in GA3 that Homeworld itself was about to completely collapse. Steven was pretty adamant about saving as many gems in addition to Peridot as possible, but then there was a problem for this: Peridots are also crazy durable, and Ruby can only take out so many by herself in a damaged state before succumbing to exhaustion. So, she inadvertently found a way to poof a bunch of Peridots at once very quickly: spout off the stupidest math possible and watch their brains break as they try to comprehend where the hell you’re pulling these numbers from.

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Ruby Math is basically Steiner Math. Pretty much the same numbers were even used, because honestly, my own math skills are so goddamn horrific, I knew I’d somehow ruin this if I tried to put too much of a different spin on it.

So yeah, definitely don’t give me credit for all of the hilarity of that scene. All I can say is, Steiner Math wasn’t so potent that it literally blew Samoa Joe and Kurt Angle’s minds.

But hah, that’s not the only reference! As if.

“I’m sorry. I love you.”

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(starts at 0:14)

Seemed like a random thing for Steven to say right after superkicking his girlfriend in the back of the head, right? Well, it’s based on this.

Sort of different ways they were utilized. Shawn Michaels says this (not really audible, but you can read his lips very easily) right before delivering his finishing move (that he had to use multiple times in a very long match) that finally took Ric Flair down and ended his very long career. Since HBK knew he was basically ending this man’s career with this action, and rightfully respects the man to the highest degree of one of the all-time greats, so it’s akin to a mercy killing.

For GA, this was the only way Steven knew how to subdue Peridot, who had gone off on Lapis and physically assaulted her for the first and only time in the story due to being in hysterics that Pumpkin was at death’s door, and Lapis was only calmly trying to drag her back down to reality. Peridot wasted valuable time she could have used to say goodbye to Pumpkin and really be there for her in her final moments to instead appeal to Steven to miraculously save her (which Steven had already all possible options on before Peridot even made it to the scene; he had to cut her off every time Peridot went off on a nonsensical tangent), then have words she herself used on Steven used on her by Lapis. Namely, the “you can’t save everybody” line. Peridot reacted by screaming at Lapis before bitchslapping her. So, Peridot was already massively trying Steven’s patience since he knew from the start there was nothing more to be done about Pumpkin and Peridot just couldn’t bring herself to accept it, hence the continued bargaining. Once she actually hurt a friend of theirs, Steven could clearly see no amount of talking would bring Peridot to her senses in time before Pumpkin completely passed on. So, Steven had to do and say things he was extremely uncomfortable about and normally would never say or do voluntarily, but Peridot, especially GA Peridot, has proved to be akin to talking to a brick wall. With a massively dwindling time limit and knowing how much worse this situation would get once Peridot realized Pumpkin died seeing her acting like this, he forced himself to push his own limits.

And really, he knew he wouldn’t really hurt Peridot with a superkick, anyway. Steven was definitely aware Peridot would be infinitely more hurt that he did it to her than the act itself. Unfortunately, Steven should have acted a little sooner, because Peridot barely got a couple of words out to Pumpkin once she was finally brought down to reality before the latter died.

On the bright side, even before Pumpkin was miraculously brought back to life, Peridot didn’t hold this against Steven in the least, and acknowledged both to him and to Lapis that she fully deserved a superkick to the head and losing her chance to say goodbye to Pumpkin for how she conducted herself.

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Luckily, it works out all nicely not just for Pumpkin’s life and Peridot/Steven maintaining their relationship by the end of GA, but the whole fusion thing for Peridot gets ironed out as well. I was a massive asshole ending the story on the confirmation of Peridot and Steven being able to fuse (no name or even a visual; the final line is literally the fusion acknowledging that they pulled it off this time), but come onnnn. I already made three original fusions as well as full-Diamond forms for Steven and Peridot, the former of which I’ve yet to properly design!

Right before they try doing this, Peridot agrees with Steven that they don’t seem like the type who’d fuse to a proper kind of dance. Instead, it’d be more like certain wrestler entrances. “Sheasaro” is mentioned, which isn’t an official term at all in WWE, but it’s what a lot of people called the tag team of Sheamus and Cesaro before they were collectively called The Bar. Anyway, I fucking love that entrance. Needless to say I’ve envisioned plenty of characters and how they’d come out to certain entrance songs and routines.

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Peridot makes it no secret that “clod” is her word, and that still rings true in GA. However, in GA exclusively there’s a close runner-up: stupid idiot.

A redundant term made awesome by Chris Jericho’s 2016-2017 persona. It just felt like a very Peridot thing to say, and with this I never had to worry about over-using the clod term.

It never happened in-story, but if GA Peridot was ever to be called out using this by pointing out its redundancy, she’d definitely insist that the term is for emphasis. That this is how to determine how much of an idiot you truly are. Because to Peridot the Genius, everyone is either stupid or an idiot. But only a few select clods can be considered both.

I feel like there’s more references than this, but these are the only ones that stand out right now. I’ll add a part 2 if I find something significant that I missed the next time I read through the fic.

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