It was the way her muscles went taut under her stripped skin that drew her.
Her feats of strength were impressive, but Jasper was not alone in them.
She did, however, turn a three gem job into a one gem job.
She heaved the grand structures without so much as a grunt, but grew impatient with the misdirection Amethyst gave her. Several times, she sat the structures back down, groaned gutterally, and stood there with her arms crossed.
Pearl almost felt guilty, not stepping in to aid. She could give much better instruction, and without intervening with puns. It was her project, after all. But observing seemed to be so much more rewarding. And Garnet often did suggest that she allow things to take course, as opposed to getting riled about progress and things not panning out precisely how she wished it to.
She should be able to afford not feeling guilty. But she did. And it hardly budged her rooted feet.
She heard Jasper bark something, and comb frustrated fingers back through the mess of her mane, tilting her head back towards the metallic ceiling as Amethyst cackled.
At least they got along.
Jasper knelt, and adjusted her grip, grunting as the engine compartment shifted in her arms.
Pearl found her teeth sinking into her bottom lip as Jasper trudged across the expanse of the room, seeming to ignore Amethyst's playful japes as she stepped over thick clusters of wires and scattered tools. She set it down heavy, and puzzled it into place with a loud screech as she pushed it just a few more inches across the floor.
"Hey P!"
Amethyst was several yard closer, greeting her with a broad grin and waving arms, and Pearl withheld any noise of surprise. She must have leaned out too far, attempting to get a better look.
She stepped down from the high platform and approached, giving a half-wave, attempting to avoid the intense gaze she could feel resting on her from the sun-kissed, predatory eyes across the room. "Amethyst. Thought you would like a break. Garnet made some-"
"OH hell yeeeaaaah!" She seemed to sing. "Jas, you want some?"
"You don't even know what she-."
"Nah," Jasper responded, never taking her eyes from Pearl.
Unperturbed, Amethyst bounded away to the warp pad beyond the open maw of their half-station, and was gone without another word.
Well. Okay.
Apprehension coiled tight in her core.
After several tense moments, Jasper finally tore her gaze away, working a crank on the engine.
At that point, she would have welcomed a stereo, at least.
It was wordlessly, widely understood that Jasper was never to be left unattended. Not yet. And gradually, it had dwindled to one of them idly watching her at a time, and she hardly seemed to mind. No volatile advancements made since their agreement. That, at least, eased her nerves a little.
As if she weren't confident in her own abilities.
It went beyond that.
Silence seemed to stretch forever. There were many things to do. Valve adjustments, voltage checks, rewiring. Instead, she stood rooted once more, and started when the other's voice shoved past the blanket of stillness.
Pearl had to blink, and refocus on the woman's face. Stars, when had she dropped her eyes lower?
"I don't know how to use this," the soldier admitted, after a time of mutual staring. Confusion melded into irritation. Was it the second time she had to speak? Pearl rubbed at the side of her head, and berated herself to attention.
A drill, of all things.
It wasn't even plugged in. While she did not laugh, she smiled a little too much, and immediately saw the displeased dip in Jasper's brow.
"That's all right!" She assured, quickly, and approached, hands help up a little. "It took me forever." Completely false. "I was used to the screw drivers they had out for a while. The thing you've been using." She rambled on, suitably flustered as she scanned for an outlet. An extension cord. Anything.
In spite of the expression on the other gem's face, she stayed patiently knelt and attentive, the too-small drill clenched in one hand with a claw idly tapping the trigger to the drill.
Of course, the extension cords were all shoved to one area, and she had to pry the most suitable one out from the tangle. Honestly, Amethyst.
Brisking her way back over, Pearl slowed when something caught her eye. Distracting enough for her to kneel, feel for the cable, plugging the drill in. "Is... Is that a chainsaw?"
"Wouldn't know," Jasper stated blandly, claw clicking on the drill's trigger again. This time, it came to life, and Jasper was practically shot back from it as it clattered to the floor, her eyes wild.
Then, Pearl had to laugh. It was short, and smothered, but Jasper shot her a glare, and what Pearl assumed to be the faintest ghost of a smile.
She was quick enough to amend, still smiling, hands up in surrender before reaching for the drill. "Sorry, sorry! There's different settings on here, and different heads you can put on for the screws in the case here... This screw is stripped. This one is called a clutch-drive. Many of them have human names. Like Phillip, or Allen."
Pearl sorted through the shapes with shaking hands as Jasper looked back and forth between the caps and screws, reaching over in front of Pearl to select the proper one, holding it up.
Pearl wanted to sink into the nearest hole, feeling her face heat marginally. The screw looked absurdly small in the other's grip. Her own hand looked absurdly small in comparison. She took it, placed it on the tip, and explained the arrows on the drill and positioning, before handing it back over.
Her eyes slid from the machinery back up the other's arm as the drill howled. She noted the curve of her bicep, the sway of the colored stripes as the muscles beneath flexed. The raw power beheld to maintain the form. She tugged at the neck of her flight uniform, feeling confined in her own attire.
The other's abdominal muscles flexed with the slightest movement beneath the skin-hugging uniform, which had hardly changed from her previous one. When Jasper leaned back at length to reach for a bolt that had traveled away from its case, Pearl got more of an eye full than she needed.
No, it was certainly needed.
She covered part of her face, felt the heat beneath her fingertips as her eyes traced the curvature of the other's chest, and she attempted to disguise the action by clearing her throat.
"Nice view today," Jasper murmured as she put the drill aside, studying the path of the engine's wiring in comparison to where it was being drilled down.
Pearl was inclined to mindlessly agree, her immediate thought tracing to the remnants of the sunset that had been outside before she entered, until she caught sight of the soldier's slight grin.
She wanted very much right then and there to get up, walk outside, and trudge into the ocean depths for the next decade. Instead, she pressed her face further into her hand.
At least Amethyst was gone for a good while. Hopefully.
"Engine's done," Jasper stated, with finality, leaning back on her haunches to look up along the wall. More wires would be fixated along the wall to the primary energy core. It was one of many engines. She could only do so much with what they had on Earth, but once she was introduced to a new scrap yard, the engineering game changed.
She felt a solid weight press into her side, and her breathing froze for a moment. Before her, Jasper produced the rough blue prints she had sketched up, in the opposite hand. Pearl had to lean to see. Leaning would set her off balance. Ever so casually, she placed a hand against the other's shoulder, and somewhere deep inside the other gem, a pleasant rumble emerged.
"Done with the lower level, for the most part. Wiring needs finished. Then upper level, then casing. That was the plan, right?" Jasper's brow scrunched as she peered at the page. "There's no weapons on this thing."
"It's meant for quick transportation."
"How far is it going to get you if you're shot out of the sky?"
A valid question.
Perhaps they were all so used to shying from these types of weaponry. Homeworld technology seemed beyond them, and Peridot was thoroughly engrossed in her own separate project.
Pearl liked this. Having her own project again. She appreciated a thoughtful suggestion over an order, even if they had become much more amicable in working together.
"I'll consider it."
"Good." Jasper sat back, more, thorough blue prints scattered to the side. Her eyes flicked across the pages, assessing.
Her hand had moved down the soldier's arm. Jasper hadn't said a word, so she stayed her hand, very idly tracing along a stripe as she thought.
No words. Jasper's arm twitched a little, coiling the muscle, and nothing more. It eased Pearl far more than she would like to admit.
She did her best to keep her mind from the gutter, but when Jasper ran her tongue over her bottom lip, and gave her a look, her mind dived straight into the dumpster. It wasn't a look of innocence, after all. There was a sort of hunger in the depths of those predatory eyes. The sort that stayed Pearl's tongue and suppressed coherent thought.
The silence was oppressive. It was made no better that the other drew closer, the gaze smoldering, and Pearl felt her breath hitch before the other relinquished a chuckle.
Jasper grinned a little, baring her teeth, and Pearl wanted to shove her away with flustered indignation.
She tried to, at least. It was like pressing against a warm brick wall, and this time, she felt the laugh the other produced, deep and genuine.
"If I'm encroaching your space, tell me. I don't think pushing does much good."
"You're not," Pearl corrected, pulling her hand away as if she touched fire.
The former Commander leaned in closer then, her breath ticklish and her voice low.
Stars, her voice. The proximity hardly helped. A near-shameful thrum traveled down to her groin.
When the other's lips brushed her own, it had been all the confirmation she needed.
She dipped forward with a keen, and Jasper caught her greedily, pulling her in flush. It had been far, far too long. She pushed back with an urgency that seemed to surprise the other soldier, but not so much as the knee that she worked between Jasper's thighs that earned her a shuddering groan. It emboldened her; the urgency that was returned.
She broke, simply to allow her eyes to roam, to retrieve the air she was so used to taking.
Jasper leaned back to accommodate her wish, and Pearl straddled one of her legs, her hips jerking down when the other trailed a gentle claw down her center only to press the pad of her thumb firm against the writhing appendage gradually making itself known.
She had to close her eyes for a moment, ground herself against the piercing, appraising gaze.
Settling her hands on the other's shoulders, she took her time exploring, down over her chest until nipples stood at attention beneath the uniform's fabric, over taut abdominals until the proud warrior purred beneath her touch. The look she was given practically pleaded for her hands to sink lower, but she rested them onto Jasper's hips and, finally, gave the other gem a smile.
A noise must have caught Jasper's attention. She had jerked her head to the side, eyes cast over her shoulder, and Pearl might have looked as well, had her attention not been wholly focused on the tendril outline writhing between the gem's legs, as massive as the rest of her.
Biting her lip, she trailed her fingers down it, and Jasper's chest heaved. Oh, how her muscles shifted and quaked to such a simple touch.
It, apparently, would have taken more energy to shift the fabric away. Jasper tugged a claw along the stretch of her uniform below her navel, freeing the dual-colored appendage from the restriction. Though there was greed in her eyes, her kiss bestowed affection, and her actions seem to stutter when Pearl pressed her body close, taking a private delight in the way the appendage writhed hard against her. Just like the rest of Jasper, it beheld raw strength, pressing back hard enough to nudge Pearl away, enough to entice her own groin.
"Can I?" Jasper murmured, nudging her leg up in gesture, immediately reigning herself back when Pearl shook her head.
Not yet.
She worked her hand over the tip, watching as Jasper's brows knit, how her arms shook as she leaned back and braced herself, how her face flushed and a fang worried her bottom lip.
Pearl could have worshipped every inch available, but in the back of her mind, urgency worried at her, and she tried to keep it at bay.
For once, she wanted to put her whole mind into just enjoying something.
She shifted back, leaned, and heard the soldier hiss, and scrape her nails against the metal flooring as Pearl dipped her tongue along the side. Impossible for her to take it all in, but it was something, and the reaction earned was priceless. She squeezed the bulbous base, drew her mouth over the tip, and earned a strangled growl. A jerk of the hips surprised her, and she settled more pressure on the base. Behave.
A murmur of profanity, a plead, the warning signs all there and Pearl's tongue exploded with thick flavor.
If Jasper had seemed flustered before, Pearl had seen nothing.
The warrior pawed at her own face, body unbelievably taut, her breath hard and fast.
So quick. A sense of giddiness arose in Pearl, overtaking surprise as she took her hands away, and cast her eyes down at the twitching, writhing appendage, licking away at the fluid that drizzled along her lip.
Jasper had the nerve to murmur the remnants of an apology, and Pearl leaned up to silence her. The kiss was graciously returned, the warrior drawling a tongue across her bottom lip, and Pearl parted needily.
She hardly expected the crushing hug, and the devious glint in eye contact when they parted.