A/N: This started off as a drabble. But then I fell in love with the idea of Connie periodically teaching Steven new vocabulary words, and I started teasing out different kinds of infallibility, and now I have a giant oneshot. XD

Some of the logic in this oneshot is pretty obviously dubious. That's intentional, because Steven is a child and sometimes Child Logic only sort of makes sense.

Enjoy!

Connie says that learning your parents aren't infallible is a part of growing up (at least, that's what her mother tells her). Initially, Steven nods and hums supportively, but after an awkward couple of seconds he breaks down and sheepishly asks what infallible means.

"It's like." Connie scrunches up her nose in thought. "Well, it's like being invincible. An infallible person can't make mistakes, or get hurt, or be wrong about anything."

"Wow—you know people like that?" Steven wants to meet them, too! They sound amazing.

Connie scratches her head, looking a little uncomfortable. "Well, no. Nobody's infallible, Steven."

"Then how is that something we're supposed to learn along the way? Shouldn't we already know?"

"My mom says that kids don't see the adults in their lives like that, and adults try and do their best to maintain the illusion for as long as they can."

"Why? Isn't that like lying?"

"I guess so?" Connie fiddles with the magenta glasses frames hooked to the collar of her blue-striped shirt. "I think it's because they want us to believe that they can protect us until we learn to protect ourselves. Like the gems!"

"Yeah, but the gems protect everybody, not just me," Steven points out.

"Don't you think they want us to believe that they can protect us?"

"I don't have to believe it, I already know!" But there are other things on the tip of his tongue that he can't quite articulate, and by the time he's figured it out Connie has already gone home for the day.

The Crystal Gems used to be infallible to Steven. They were all so cool, so strong, so magical! There was nothing they couldn't accomplish, no foe they couldn't defeat. They were the Crystal Gems, after all! They would always find a way to save the day.

What Steven didn't realize was that, sometimes, saving the day can be a matter of trial and error. Sometimes you fail on the first try, and the Crystal Gems know that better than anyone.

It all starts with Pearl.

Her swordplay demonstration against holo-Pearl is so cool! She moves so gracefully through the air, and the clashing of those swords in the otherwise peaceful silence is enough to send shivers down Steven's spine. Learning sword fighting himself is about a hundred times less invigorating—but still, Pearl's demonstration was amazingly inspiring, and Steven was really excited!

That is, until her own hologram stabs her in the back and she disappears in a puff of white smoke.

It doesn't matter if the gems' bodies are only illusions, a part of Steven still has to wonder how close getting poofed and dying really are to each other, because the emotion that rises in his chest and clogs his throat as he holds Pearl's cool, unresponsive gem in his palms feels a lot like grief.

Pearl can be hurt. Steven knows that now. She can be careless, too—that's also something he never knew about her before, and his young mind struggles to reconcile these new, hard earned facts with the safety-minded, meticulous, graceful-yet-strong person he's always known Pearl to be.

He is challenged once again when he sees her curled up on that floating island by the strawberry battlefields, clutching his mom's sword, so lost and hurt, and all he can think to do is hug her. "Well, I think you're pretty great."

Maybe if Pearl remembers that she's loved, she won't be so sad anymore.

By then, Steven's already seen Pearl cry once, on day when he accidentally made himself so old he almost lost consciousness entirely. Still, nothing can prepare him for the tiny sniff he hears, or the minute shudder that makes its way down her spine as she tries valiantly to hold herself in.

That's right, Steven thinks then, his heart clenching in his chest. Pearl isn't infallible.

His dad is next. Dads aren't supposed to get broken legs, right? They aren't supposed to cry out in pain. They're supposed to make jokes and teach Dad Stuff and wash cars and jam out with Steven on guitar and ukulele, respectively. Dads are supposed to smile and hug Steven until they're both so warm with father-son affection that they can barely speak.

His dad isn't like the Crystal Gems, though. Dad is human; he's just not made of the same tough stuff as Garnet and Pearl and Amethyst. That makes sense to Steven, and even though his dad has a broken leg they're still able to laugh and jam out, so it's not so bad. His dad is still his dad, no matter what. He always seems to know the right things to say and do.

When Dad starts abusing the warp whistle is when Steven realizes that even dads can make poor choices. Either he doesn't realize that Steven and the gems are doing important stuff, or he doesn't care. No matter which is true, it still sits funny with Steven. His dad has always been very respectful of gem stuff, and he's always been supportive (if apprehensive) of Steven helping with that. Why change his mind now?

Sometimes, Steven thinks, even dads don't know the right thing to do. After all, he's not infallible.

Amethyst's fallibility is hard to adjust to in a completely different way. She's always been reckless; the fact that she makes mistakes is nothing new. But nothing gets Amethyst down—it's practically a superpower. She only feels the way she wants to feel, no matter what anyone says. Even when her gem is almost cracked in two and she's laying in slithery pieces on the ground in front of his mom's fountain, she still finds it in herself to make a joke at Steven's expense. This doesn't make seeing her hurt any less awful—because let Steven tell you, it worries him to tears every time—but Amethyst's infallibility has never come from her physical prowess. Not to Steven.

Amethyst is always laughing. Always joking. She's the funniest, most fun-loving person that Steven knows. It's so awesome to play the Tiger Millionaire to her Purple Puma! Amethyst is exciting and inventive, and the easygoing way she conducts herself never fails to pique Steven's admiration. And all of her stuff! Steven has no choice but to admire her collecting (and stacking) abilities.

The day they act like the No Home Boys is the catalyst for Steven's realization. It starts as a niggling sensation on the train, when he sees her looking up at the sunset streaked clouds with melancholy. He can't push the notion away, but he doesn't quite understand it enough to act on it, either. Things just—don't seem as lighthearted as they were before.

Still, Amethyst seems pretty happy about showing him around the Kindergarten's towering, hole-pocked cliffs and spiky machines poised over the barren earth like so many hungry mosquitos. She's laughing nostalgically and introducing him to boulders of various sizes, so it can't be all bad, right?

That's about when Pearl shows up, and Steven sees a side of Amethyst he never even knew existed.

The sound of Amethyst's eternal good cheer cracking and falling away is a small one; you can't hear it over her broken screams, or the snapping of her whips, or Pearl's shouts.

"I don't want to fight you!"

"I wouldn't want to fight me neither!"

The rumbling of collapsing earth as Pearl shoots at the cliffs and misses again and again perfectly covers Steven's small moan as he watches two of the people he loves and respects most fight like they're going to destroy each other.

"I'm not going to let you stand there and remind me of everything I hate about myself!" roars Amethyst—and you can't hear it over the sizzling of the energy she's sending down the length of her whips, or the resulting explosion that sends Pearl flying, but Steven's heart is breaking. Amethyst hates herself?

"Amethyst! Amethyst, Amethyst, Amethyst!" he screams as the injector tumbles down on top of them, and Amethyst isn't in his bubble, she won't come close enough for him to protect her, she's running away…

When the dust settles, and he finds her curled up in the hole she was made in, telling him to leave because she'll corrupt him with her inherent evilness, Steven knows it's going to take more than he has to fix this. He's numb inside as he watches her tears fall. Everyone cries, and there's no shame in it—Steven is moved to tears all the time—but he never would have expected Amethyst, of all people, to have been hiding such an awful unhappiness inside of her.

Amethyst isn't infallible, Steven sees then. There are moments when she can't remember to laugh and love herself, and he and Pearl and Garnet will have to do it for her until she gets on her own two feet again.

Garnet's fallibility is at once the hardest and easiest to come to terms with. She's so cool, so mysterious, so monumentally strong—she always knows what to say and do, and there's nothing she's afraid of. The respect she commands is nearly palpable. Steven can't help but look up to her, want to be like her.

Garnet trusts him, too. She's passed her future vision onto him before—she's told him about it, period—and doing things "Steven's way" is a decision she makes surprisingly often. If Garnet can trust him that much, Steven figures, then he must be doing something right. Garnet's opinion means the world to him. He's never had such reverence for someone, even his mom.

That's probably why watching the stupendously powerful Garnet fall apart, three eyes wide and staring sightlessly because Jasper's just stabbed her with a gem destabilizer and she's too hurt to keep her physical form, frightens him so badly. If Jasper can beat Garnet—who always, always wins—then she can beat anybody. They don't stand a chance.

Steven never knew that Garnet could be defeated. No monster can hold a candle to her mighty gauntlets. She can swim through lava. Nothing ever seems to faze her—even when she says to his face that she's unsettled and nervous, she does it in such an even and calm tone that Steven can't quite believe her.

The idea of Garnet's infallibility became strained when she finds him on the roof in the rain and admits she's made a mistake, but it crumples like an old napkin when all Steven sees is what's left of her, two gems lying indifferently in the sand.

Then all of the dents are punched back out and reinforced when he meets Ruby and Sapphire, and finds out that Garnet herself is a fusion—could there be anything cooler? No, Steven thinks. Nothing is cooler than that. Garnet has reformed stronger than ever, and she's never scared, and she never ceases to amaze him.

Of course, now he wants nothing more than to get to know Ruby and Sapphire better (ugh, can't his birthday come any sooner?), but he supposes that will come in due time. In the meanwhile, Garnet's pretty good about handling his affectionate heckling.

It isn't until they find the cluster that Steven allows his impression of Garnet's infallibility to fall softly away. The cluster does more than simply bother her—it's so terrifying, so utterly grotesque and wrong, that it nearly tears her apart. It won't be long until Steven sees Garnet's frailties again, in a little motel in the Keystone State, but by then all of the pieces have finally, finally clicked into place.

"Hey Connie," he says as they sit on the beach outside of the temple together in the late afternoon sunshine. "Would you say that being infallible is like being perfect?"

His friend takes a moment to think about this, gazing out over the swaying water and humming thoughtfully. Finally she says, "Well, yeah, I guess you could say they're kind of the same thing."

"Adults aren't perfect. Gems aren't, either."

The wind pushes Connie's poofy dark hair across her cheek, and she brushes it back behind her ear with a frown. Her eyebrows furrow with concern. "Steven, what brings this on? Did something happen?"

"A lot of things." Steven cups a handful of sand and lets it trickle through his fingers. "I used to think that Dad and the gems couldn't make mistakes or feel lonely or get scared or hurt, like me. Pearl is always safe, Dad always knows what to do, Amethyst is always happy, and Garnet always wins and is never scared of anything."

After a beat Connie says quietly, "That sounds like a lot to live up to."

"It is." Steven allows his hand to fall onto his leg. His fingers clench. "And-and I think it might have been unfair of me to expect them to be like that. Nobody's perfect. Nobody's infallible."

"Does it bother you, knowing that about your dad and the gems?"

"I thought so, at first," he confesses. "But I think it's helped me to know them all so much better these last few months, way better than I knew them before I realized they weren't perfect. I think they're even stronger and cooler now, because I know that they've worked to overcome those weaknesses. Being perfect is a lot of pressure, but I think it's even harder to face the things you're afraid of straight on like they always do."

Connie doesn't speak for a minute or so. Steven is just about to apologize for ranting when she tells him, "You know, when something is invincible, it can't be beaten. Not by anything, no matter what. But," here she offers a slow spreading smile. "It doesn't say anything about having to do it on the first try."

Steven isn't as smart as Connie. When she finds loopholes like this, sometimes it takes him a moment to catch up. This time must be the exception, though, because he knows exactly where she's going with this.

The Crystal Gems save the day, no matter what. Even if it takes them a few tries, they always, always find a way to succeed. Isn't caring so deeply that you're willing to face down impossible odds and win anyway so much more impressive than just being perfect? Isn't admitting that you're wrong and working to improve yourself more admirable than being right on the first try?

Pearl can get hurt, Dad doesn't always know the right thing to do, Amethyst can cry, and Garnet can get scared. The adults in his life aren't infallible. But they also refuse to give up, and that makes them invincible, which Steven is starting to think is way, way cooler.

Connie's still looking at him, expecting a response. I'm lucky to know them, Steven thinks as he catches himself and smiles back. All of them.

"Yeah, you're right, it doesn't say that anywhere," he says, feeling himself swell in pride and love for the amazing people in his life. "Being invincible is way better than being infallible, anyway."