An unknown face. An unfriendly visitor from the Homeworld!
Amber sighed, opening her eyes. Apparently at some point overnight, she had managed to slip out of that weird little cuddle sandwich. She was hardly upset about that. It was far less comforting than she had hoped it would be. She yawned, sitting up, and seeing that green one sitting in front of a window-Heliotrope. That was her name. Amber blinked. "The crap are you doing?" Heliotrope turned back toward Amber. "Oh, uh, I can absorb energy into my gem," Heliotrope motioned around the area where the human hearts were. Wait, was her gem INSIDE of her? That's...a new one. "It doesn't take much, so I sunbathe sometimes. It helps. It also helped me during a...bad time."
Amber raised an eyebrow. "Bad time how?" Heliotrope turned back towards the window. "Corruption." Amber made a noise of sympathy. She looked around. "So, uh, where did Larimar go?" Heliotrope shrugged. "She does this, sometimes. Goes out to look for 'shiny' things. 'Shiny', in this case, being a synonym of 'interesting'."
Amber sighed. "Alrighty then." She stood up and sat back down in the beanbag behind her. After a while of silence, Larimar knocked on the door and walked in. "Back!~" She said cheerily, a sack slung over her shoulder. Heliotrope turned around, looking refreshed. "Hi, Lari." She said, smiling. "So, what have you got today?" Larimar plopped the sack down and starting scrummaging around in it. Eventually, she started pulling out random items. An empty water bottle, a blanket, a plush cat, and a cow skull.
Amber sighed and reclined in her beanbag, taking her revolver out. "Ya know, Ah wonder why they call these things 'revolvers'. Ah haven't seen it revolve." She spun it by the trigger. "Maybe 'cause it makes ya look badass when you spin it." She said, smiling. After a bit more fiddling, she was interrupted by a skeletal bovine being thrust in her face. "Wheee, I'm a shiny horn thing!" Larimar said, smiling wide. Amber jumped, shifting back slightly further back into her beanbag. "It's called a cow, hun." Amber said, gently pushing down on the skull. Larimar popped it back up. "Wheee, I'm a shiny cow!~"
Amber shook her head. She was starting to think that Larimar genuinely had changed. Somehow. She began thinking. "Hey, Lari, you feel like learning how to shoot that weapon you got?" Larimar tilted her head. "Sure." Amber smiled, popping up out of her beanbag. "Good, because Ah'm bored, and that'll make me un-bored." Larimar smiled. "Okay!" She walked out of the ship, Amber following behind.
Peridot grumbled, staring at her screen. "Stupid...clods...and now I'm stranded in the middle of a desert." She looked up to see..."A gem ship!" She said, closing her screen and running towards it excitedly. "NICE TO FINALLY SEE SOME EVAC!" She yelled, loud enough for anybody in there to here. No response. Peridot kept approaching, seeing that the ship was out of commission. "Oh. Crashed." She smiled sinisterly. "But I can fix that."
"Who's there?" She heard a slightly nasally voice (kinda reminiscent of her own, thinking on it) call out from the ship. Apparently there was somebody inside. Interesting. "A...gem." She eventually decided to say. Peridot squinted as she saw another gem exit the ship. She walked closer, eventually starting to recognize her. "Hey, aren't you the test pilot for the ship we sent out?" Heliotrope. That was her name. She nodded, suspicious. "Yeah. I am."
Peridot thought. She seemed to be staying here for an extended period of time. Maybe..."Could I perhaps take a look at that ship?" Heliotrope hrmed. "Well, I could let you see it...that is to say, I 'could'." She turned away from Peridot, occasionally glancing back. Peridot blinked. "What exactly do you mean by that?"
"Well, it's kinda my home here, so it lifting off back to homeworld would not be very good for me. Especially with the friends I made here." Peridot screamed internally, but tried to remain calm on the outside. "Well, but if you're intending on leaving it here, surely there's some parts to it you don't need anymore I could...borrow. Or buy. Or whatever." Heliotrope hrmed again. "I don't know..." She said, in a tone that made it clear she was trying to mess with Peridot. "This is relatively old tech. I have been away from homeworld for a while, after all. So for all I know, this is all outdated." She shrugged.
Peridot continued to do her best to conceal her frustration, starting to fail a bit. "I don't need new tech, I need tech that works. That's all." After a second, Heliotrope turned back to her. "I suppose I have no reason not to let you browse." She said, motioning for Peridot to follow her into her ship. Peridot did so, sighing in relief.
Peridot walked up to the ship, the relic of past gem advancements sitting the dirt. It's exterior was mostly worn away by the elements, leaving it rather dirty and dull on the outside. Peridot chuckled and sighed, running one floating hand across it's surface. "This used to be cutting edge..." She muttered.
Heliotrope opened the door, showing the insides. In contrast, they were pristine, looking essentially untouched since the day it was launched. It was slightly rearranged, however, being rather open and having a few odd relics scattered about-probably something from Earth.
One set of relics caught Peridot's attention the most. Some odd, baggy things, strewn all around the area. She walked over and pushed it, before trying to sit in it. She jumped upon feeling it sag. "Is this some sort of...earthling torture device?" Heliotrope blinked at her. "nnooo, it's something you sit on. It's very comfortable." As if to demonstrate, Heliotrope sat down in one. 'must be some way to turn them off...' Peridot thought, avoiding these obvious traps. "Anyway," heliotrope said, waving a hand dismissively. "Feel free to look around a bit, if you want." Peridot nodded and started searching around for useful materials.
There wasn't a whole lot. Most of it was broken, or far too old for her to operate. Eventually, she settled on trying for a few lightbulbs, and some systems for deep-space that the pilot wouldn't miss, if she was planning on staying on Earth for some asinine reason like she said she was. Peridot started unscrewing a lightbulb. "Soooo..." She said, somewhat suspicious of Heliotrope. "Seen any other gems here?"
"Why do you ask?" Heliotrope asked in a frank, serious tone. "Just making conversation." Peridot said, well aware that Heliotrope wouldn't buy it. She heard Heliotrope grumble a bit, but otherwise she didn't respond. Peridot didn't pursue the mattter. The test pilot was clearly hiding something, but if she pried too much...well, the pilot would likely return in kind. After a while of silence, she spoke up again. "So, how long have you been here? This is a question I'm willing to answer, too."
"Well, based on my knowledge of how they measure time here...just shy under 70 Earth years." Peridot nodded. "That's about 69 years and 358 days longer than me."
Pause.
"So, given you know me, and are interested in my ship, I can presume you are a scinetist of some kind?" Peridot shrugged. "Scientist. IT adviser. Kindergarten worker. General knowledge gem, yes." Peridot managed to unscrew the bulb she was working on, and moved over to another one. She turned back towards Heliotrope. "Were you leading into anything with that?" Heliotrope shrugged. "No, like you said, just making conversation."
Despite that, Peridot and Heliotrope sat in silence, until Peridot eventually came out with a net gain of a couple lightbulbs. Fun. "Well, I do believe that's about all I can salvage from this." She said, turning around. Heliotrope raised an eyebrow. "Really? Well, I guess that makes sense, I haven't really repaired much." Peridot slowly walked out of the ship, not breaking eye contact with Heliotrope. The pilot didn't seem particularly interested in doing so either.
Peridot walked out, before seeing another gem approaching.
Larimar!?
Peridot dropped her lightbulbs, before running off and opening her screen.
Peridot finally stopped running when she was confident she wasn't followed. She turned around, trying to find any signs of anybody doing so, thankfully coming up empty. She sighed in relief, before turning her attention to her open screen.
"Log number 502." She said, talking along with her typing. "I came across one of those test pilots we sent out in the middle of some random desert. She seems to have turned her ship inot some sort of...domicile. I managed to outsmart her and convince her to let me take some parts, though only after much suspicion on both sides."
Pause.
"I also found that tool, Larimar, but she didn't seem to recognize. At the time I ran away, for what I would hope would be rather obvious reasons, but I'll have to talk to her on the off-chance I run into her again."
Peridot sighed and closed her screen. At least something came out of this.
Amber lay back in her beanbag, continuing to fiddle with her revolver, while Larimar snuggled with the now clean cat plushy. "Errth things are so soft~" She said happily, while Heliotrope watched on, smiling wide. Amber nodded, holding her head. That damn headache again. What was with that stupid thing? "'Ss a nice place, fer the most part." Dammit, it was getting worse. Her other hand clutched her head, and she scrunched up. "Amb...r? Wh...ong?"
Out like a light.
"DiaNe? ARE YoU sUrE This is A GoOD Idea?"
Amber jolted up, taking a deep breath, seeing both Heliotrope and Larimar hovering over her. She blinked. ""H-hi?" the other two gems looked at her, concerned. "What...was that?" Larimar asked, stepping away. Heliotrope did the same. Amber stammered a bit, trying her best to think of some farfetched cover story, before eventually sighing. "No point in hiding it anymore..." She said, shaking her head.
She scrunched herself up in her beanbag. "Ah got...memories. Fuzzy ones. Of humans. Except...I think...I am one. They used to be stronger. Probably remembered some names at some point. But I still got 'em. And then...well, I just found out that I used to be named 'Diane'." Heliotrope blinked, surprised, and probably unsure of how exactly to respond. And Larimar...well, she was a bit hard to read. She sat down, expression blank. In fact...weirdly blank. She looked like she was staring off into space, mouth hanging slightly open. "She do that a lot?" Amber asked Heliotrope, kinda confused as to what was going on. Her head gem started glowing, surprising the both of them. "She do that a lot!?" Amber asked, getting up and walking over.
Amber waved a hand in front of Lari's face. "Earth to Larimar?" "Errth..." Larimar muttered, distantly. Amber blinked, stepping back. "Errth...Errth..." Larimar continued muttering, not reacting. "Yeah?" Amber said, raising an eyebrow. "What about it?" "Gem...Gem...
Rebellion..."
"REBELLE-WHAT NOW!?" Amber yelled, her hand hovering around her gem. 'I AM NOT GETTING GODDAMN SUDDEN AMBUSHED ABOUT THIS!" "Rebellion..." Larimar continued muttering, not reacting to Amber's outburst. "What about the rebellion?" Amber growled. Larimar's head gem stopped glowing, as she blinked, bewildered. "Huh? What happened?"
Amber squinted. "You started repeating random words at us." She moved her hands away from her gem and folded her arms. Heliotrope sighed. "You started muttering about some kinda gem rebellion here...not that I'm opposed to them rebelling against what I think they're rebelling against." Amber breathed out slowly through her nose. Larimar continued looking at Heliotrope, confused. "Huh?"
Heliotrope shook her head. "Another long story." Amber smirked. "Full of 'em, ain't we?" she chuckled. Larimar looked at them weirdly, obviously not sure about what the crap they were talking about. Amber sighed, sitting down into her beanbag. "Weird..."
After a while of not talking, Larimar stood up. "I think I'm gonna go out and look for more shinies." Amber shrugged. "Ah'll come, too. Ain't doin' nothin' else." Larimar smiled, holding a hand out to help Amber out of her chair. Amber looked at her, slightly annoyed, getting up fine on her own. "See ya later, Heli." She said, waving a hand at her. Heliotrope smiled and waved back, while Larimar opened the door and stepped out.
Peridot watched from behind a rock at Larimar, while she was out searching for...something. "Psssst!" Peridot said, leaning out from behind the rock and motioning for Larimar to come behind it with her. Larimar turned her head, before eventually walking over and sitting behind the rock with Peridot. "Larimar, give me a status report."
Larimar blinked. "Status report?" "Yes, on the mission, you clod." Larimar continued to look confused. "Mission?" "The thing we sent you here for!? I thought you were smarter than this." Larimar shook her head. "I have never met you before, but nice to meet you Peridot." She tilted her head. "How do you know my name." Peridot squinted in disbelief. "You...you're not joking, are you? I don't remember you being the kind to make jokes." Larimar blinked. "Do...you not remember your mission? How can you not remember that?" Larimar made a small sound of frustration. "What mission?" "YOUR MISSION TO CO-" Peridot was cut off by the feeling of something cold touching her back. "G'mornin', bitch." a voice said from behind her. "Ah don't know if'n yer sendin' any 'a them logs to Yellow Diamond, but you are...Tell 'er Amber says 'hi' from sunny screw-youtopia.
Move, Lari." Larimar did as she was told, and Peridot felt a pure bolt of energy rush through her chest.
Larimar caught the poofed Peridot. "W-what did you do!?" She asked, aghast. "Ah poofed her." Amber said simply, picking up some limbs from the ground. She dumped them in Larimar's hands. "Here, ya wanted shinies, take some damn shinies." Larimar did so, looking contemplative. What was she about to say? Had she mistaken her for someone else? Did she know her from her past? She heard Amber say something about modifying gems, or something, but she didn't pay much attention. "She...knew me?" Larimar muttered. Amber clicked her tongue. "Even if she did, Ah wouldn't believe a word she said. These homeworld types got tongues 'a silver and hearts 'a coal."
Larimar looked at Amber, bewildered. Amber sighed. "Homeworld sent a gem to us. Ah don't know if it was fer me, or you, or Heli, or whoever, but they did it." Larimar shook her head. "She knew me." Amber shook her head. "C'mon, Lari, Ah toldja not to trust them." She said, somewhat sympathetically. Larimar continued to stare, before starting to shake. "Lari? You doin' alright, girl?" "I-I'm scared." She said, crying a bit. Amber sighed. "If'n homeworld is sending troops, ya oughta be...But...Ah wouldn't worry about it fer now. They usually only send Peridots fer scouts at worst. And scouts ain't much good dead." Amber smiled.
Larimar looked at Amber, confused. She sighed. "Hoped Ah'd go at 'least a year before seeing any 'a these guys..." Amber muttered. Larimar didn't pay much mind to it. "If she knew me...then there are other gems that know me?" She felt Amber put a hand on her shoulder. "Larimar. She mighta said she knew you, but don't. Trust. Them." Lari kept shaking. "I...I don't remember-" "DO YOU THINK AH DON'T KNOW WHAT NOT REMBERIN' SHIT IS LIKE!?" "STOP! YELLING!" Amber and Larimar turned to see Heliotrope, looking stressed. "You know what? Fine." Amber said, frustrated. "I'll be back at the ship." She let go of Larimar and stormed off in the direction of the ship. Larimar blinked, feeling Heliotrope hug her. "I-I'm sorry..." Heliotrope shook hr head. "I-It's okay, Lari." She sniffed. She put a hand out, motioning slightly for Peridot's gem. Larimar blinked, before handing it to her. "I j-just...this was getting a bit stressful, so..." Heliotrope said, looking somewhat guilty.
Larimar nodded. "Heli? Go to Amber, I need s-some alone time. Figure out what to do about the poofed gem." Heliotrope nodded, walking off. "O-okay, Lari."
Amber heard Heliotrope enter. Amber folded her arms and buried her head in them, hearing the sound of assorted junk being displaced, presumably from her putting the Peridot gem onto it. "They're liars, you know." Amber said, scrunching up. "The lot of them." "...look, sorry I yelled, Amber. I just...I get a bit like that when I feel stressed." Heliotrope said, sounding guilty. "I'm sorry too. It's just...before I left, they told me...things. About me. About mom. About who I-" Amber coughed a bit. "Who Ah used to be."
Amber grasped her knees tightly. "As say 'told' like a lick of it was true. It just...don't add up. But sometimes...when Ah'm just sitting alone, I wonder if I ever really cared about her. If she ever really cared about me." Amber heard Heliotrope sit down in front of her. "I don't really know what you've been through...at all. But...I can be here for you." Amber felt Heliotrope put a hand on her arm. She looked up at her, smiling weakly. Eventually, she sighed. "I'm not sure I know what I've been through..." Heliotrope smiled weakly. "Cuddle?" Amber shook her head. "It didn't help last time, it won't help now." She stood up and sat down in a beanbag.
Larimar walked in, still holding the gem's weird limb things. She saw Heliotrope and Amber sitting apart from each other, Amber looking rather grumpy. "I-I'm sorry, Amber..." She said, sheepishly. "The hell're you apologizing for?" Amber asked, shrugging. "Upsetting you?" Amber shook her had. "You had a chance to actually learn somethin' about yer past, and Ah interrupt it 'cause Ah don't wanna face my own. Ah oughta be apologizin' ta you." Larimar smiled. "It's okay. I forgive you." Amber smiled up at Larimar. "I haven't made much of a good first impression, have I? I'm usually much happier than this." Larimar giggled, putting the limb thingies away and hugging Amber, who looked away and blushed. "...I've been thinking." Larimar said, letting go of Amber. "Amber, Heli?" Amber simply looked up at Larimar, while Heli turned and said "Yes?"
Larimar sighed. "I want to go back...to-to where I woke up." Amber shrugged. "You think i'monna stop ya?" Larimar shook her head. "I want you to come." Heliotrope nodded. "Of course." Amber sighed. "I...Yeah. Alright." Larimar smiled. "Not now, though." Heliotrope once again nodded, and hugged Larimar gently. "Guys?" Amber and Heliotrope looked up at Lari again. "Thanks." She said, smiling. The others returned in kind. "Ya know..." Amber said, shifting around a bit. "Mah life ain't been all that great...but I mean it when I say that I think you two're the best thing that's happened to me in a long time."
Larimar and Heliotrope smiled, sitting down in a beanbag, cuddling together. Amber tapped on her gem and sighed. "Ah think Ah need to sleep again." Larimar nodded. "Sleep is always good. I like that hooman custom." Amber smiled, laying back. "G'night, Lari." Larimar smiled. "Good night, Amber."
