There was only so much Lapis could bear, being contained on the same ship with someone like Jasper—especially when the latter was in a bad mood, as was the case now. Any opportunity that could be seized to get out of the path of Jasper's ire was to be jumped on, so when Lapis found an open room to duck into to hide, she was swift to claim the opportunity.
Of course, there was the matter of the room she ducked into being Peridot's workroom. It might not have been such a bad thing—except for the fact that Peridot was working in here. If whatever she was doing, sitting in the middle of the floor with one of her feet drawn up to her chest and a tool clenched between her teeth, could be called working. "What are you doing in here?" she asked, barely affording Lapis a sidelong glance.
"I just wanted a place to… visit for a while," Lapis explained, rubbing the back of her neck. "Jasper's in such a foul mood…"
Peridot hmphed in reply. "You can stay here, but you have to help."
"Thank you," Lapis replied sincerely, crossing the room to kneel next to Peridot. "So… What are you working on?"
"This ankle," Peridot began, wrenching her foot back up to her chest and trying to hold it and manipulate her tools at the same time, "isn't working properly, and the auto-repairs can't fix it." The tools in her robotic hands slipped and clattered to the floor, and she glared at them as though they had offended her. "And apparently, neither can I."
Lapis nodded slightly, remembering the way Peridot had been favoring the ankle in question as of late. "I can do the repairs if you'd like," she offered.
For a moment, the prospect of anyone else working on the joints of her casing seemed to annoy Peridot, but then she nodded and passed the tools to the other Gem. "Before you start, get me something to read form my workstation," she requested.
Nodding in understanding, Lapis stood long enough to fetch one of the small data pads strewn about Peridot's work station—and there were well over a dozen from which to choose; most of them, simply by glancing at the contents, had to do with Earth. "You're doing a lot of research about Earth," she noted as she sat by Peridot, bringing the other Gem's injured ankle into her lap.
"It's a backwards, primitive dirtball," Peridot commented, pulling up some information on the pad's display screen, "but it's interesting to study." She looked up to point around the area where Lapis would be focusing. "Some alignment rods are out of place—you'll see it when you go in."
"What are you studying?" Lapis asked, picking up a tool to open the casing's joint.
"The language," Peridot replied. "That's what this is about." She lifted the pad she was reading slightly.
"What's special about the human language?" Lapis asked, laying aside the piece of Peridot's casing that she had just removed. " I know there are all kinds of languages on Earth—"
"They have different words for their people," Peridot cut off, almost impulsively.
Lapis paused in her work to look up at the other Gem. "What do you mean?"
"It's…" Peridot shifted slightly, as though trying to get comfortable. "We have our word for a Gem, right?" She didn't wait for Lapis to reply. "In the human language, their word is something called 'she.'"
"Okay," Lapis replied, nodding to show that she understood.
"There's a secondary word for those who don't meet the criteria for she."
Lapis carefully lifted the last panel away to start making the repairs, but paused at Peridot's explanation. "Secondary?"
Peridot nodded once in confirmation before laying the data pad to the side. "I ran some tests on it—"
"What kind of test could you do on a word?" Lapis asked abruptly.
"A social experiment of sorts," Peridot corrected, "using myself as the test subject."
"What was the experiment?" Lapis asked, swapping out the tool in her hand for one better suited to realign the rods (three of them—no wonder Peridot had been limping).
"I referred to myself using these secondary words," Peridot replied. "They're called 'he' and 'his.'"
Lapis turned these words over in her mind; as when Peridot had spoken them, they had no Common Gem equivalent, and the English words stood out in the breathiness of their native tongue like beacons. "How did it turn out?" she asked, gently working the first of the misaligned rods back into place.
For a moment, the only sound was that of Lapis realigning the rods in Peridot's ankle, a gentle tap, tap, tap of metal on crystal. Finally—"I like the secondary ones more," the latter admitted.
"You do?" Lapis asked, pausing in her work as she looked up at Peridot, searching her—his?—eyes.
"They feel more natural," Peridot replied, meeting her gaze easily. "I like them."
Lapis nodded, thinking about this information for a moment, before shrugging slightly. "Okay."
There was silence for several moments more, then Peridot spoke. "I didn't mean to tell you all that," he mumbled. "It's nothing you need to worry about."
"Would you rather I forget we talked about it?" she offered, finishing tapping the last rod into place.
"You don't have to say anything to any other Gems about it," Peridot clarified, watching Lapis cover and re-secure the ankle joint.
Given who the "other Gems" in this situation were, it was something Lapis could certainly understand. "Got it," she agreed as she finished securing the outermost cover of the joint.
Peridot withdrew his ankle and turned and bent it, testing the repairs and nodding his approval. "…And?"
"Hmm?" Lapis looked up from gathering the tools to return to their owner.
Now, it was Peridot's turn to meet Lapis' gaze. "Call me by the secondary words."
"Call you by he and him?" Lapis echoed.
The other Gem nodded resolutely. "I am Peridot, he or him."
To Lapis' knowledge, no Gem had ever done such a thing as adopt different words for themselves, but the look in Peridot's eyes, even concealed behind a visor, was one of completely sincerity. These foreign words must have meant a lot for Peridot to say something. "Sure."