The next morning, 10:30 AM
Peridot woke up. Getting up from the moss she had spent the night on, she surveyed her surroundings. She was in a relatively large forest, with a fair number of trees. Birds sang, butterflies flittered around, and the extraterrestrial organism sighed happily.
When Peridot had landed in the forest the week before, the first thing she did was to retreat to her gem and try to regenerate her foot, something she had never needed to do. But when she did, her arms and legs did not go into her gem with her.
Suddenly, she had remembered something from the very first moment of her life: as soon as she had been born, she was struck with a destabilizer and forced back into her gem. In the middle of her regeneration process, synthetic lower arms and legs were fit over her limbs, preventing her natural ones from forming completely. But now, Peridot had natural arms and legs, which included proper hands instead of floating fingers.
Peridot did not care if her superiors found out about that. Or if her superiors found her at all. The time she had spent in the woods led her to realize what exactly the Crystal Gems were fighting for: the natural beauty that surrounded her, something the Diamond Sisters who controlled Homeworld with three iron fists could not understand.
Peridot looked at her robonoids, who she had transported there to keep her company.
"I can't spend all my time here," she said to the voiceless machines. "I should go and interact with the humans. Or at least, try to; I've heard things about what they do to lifeforms not native to this planet."
The robonoids said nothing. But one of them gave a small movement almost like a nod of approval. Peridot smiled, and walked out of the forest, ten little robots following her. An eleventh, slightly gold-tinted one which Peridot did not notice peeked out from its hiding place behind a tree and quickly scooted itself behind the herd.
Peridot arrived at the beach. She marveled at what she saw: pristine blue water, beautiful white sand, a short purple woman playing frisbee with a short chubby tween - wait, what?
"Crystal Gems," Peridot said to herself, surprised, but not really. She quickly scooted herself into a bush. The robonoids followed suit.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the beach, Steven and Amethyst happily played a little game of catch with the frisbee, while Pearl paced and Garnet sat on the ground meditating.
"Go long, Steven!" Amethyst shouted.
Steven did so. Amethyst ran backwards, arms outstretched. "I got it...I got it..." she said, not paying attention to where she was going. She ran into the bush Peridot was hiding in, and both Gems fell out in a tangle of limbs. As a further insult, the frisbee hit Amethyst on the head. "Ow."
"What the - PERIDOT!" Pearl exclaimed. She, Garnet, and Steven rushed over while Amethyst got herself untangled - and immediately realized who she had run into.
"Stay back!" Garnet snapped, summoning her gauntlets.
Peridot gulped.
"Guys, Gems shouldn't be fighting each other," Steven said, which was followed by "Hey Peridot, what happened to your hands?"
"I regenerated. Long story," the olivine replied.
"Are you gonna hurt us? Or Earth?"
"No. I changed my mind about this planet and you."
The Gems looked at her, uncertain.
"Are you telling the truth?" Pearl asked.
"Because if you aren't..." Garnet added, pounding her fists together.
"Look, I've realized how wrong I've been. The Gems on Homeworld are monsters. Whoever this 'Rose Quartz' is, she was a good person."
Garnet relaxed her arms a little. She was about to ask the specifics of Peridot's decision when the ocean bubbled and churned, and a 20-foot-tall, green creature with darker green stripes, six arms (four of which served as legs), four eyes, and a mouth full of sharp teeth fixed into an evil grin rose out of the water.
"Malachite," Steven whispered.
"Well," Malachite growled. "If it isn't the Crystal traitors. Thought you could rebel against the Diamond Sisters and get away with it? Think again." She summoned Jasper's helmet and Lapis' wings of water, combining them into a pair of demonic-looking wings lined with razor-sharp shards of pure malachite. She demonstrated the power of her weapon by sweeping her left wing across the cliff face, leaving six large diagonal gashes.
The Gems looked at the monstrous fusion, horrified, but quickly snapped back into reality. "You're goin' down!" Amethyst exclaimed, summoning her whip. Pearl summoned her spear, and Garnet lifted her arms, ready to punch Malachite somewhere sensitive.
While the Crystal Gems fought Malachite, Peridot stood in terror. "Do something!" Steven said.
"She did it...Jasper fused with Lapis," Peridot said weakly. "I never thought Jasper would fuse with anyone, let alone a Lazuli."
"Aren't you going to hit her with your energy-blaster thing?"
"That was a function of my synthetic arm, not my natural one!" She thought, and said, "Wait. I think I had a destabilizer in my escape pod. Did my pod survive?"
"Yep," Steven said, bubbling himself and sending himself to the temple. Peridot stood there for a few moments, then Steven came back in another bubble, which he popped. In his right hand was a golden-yellow device with two prongs, an arc of electricity humming between them.
Malachite had shaken off the Crystal Gems, and was making her way to the temple.
"Amethyst! I need to borrow your whip," Peridot called.
"Why?"
"You'll see in a moment."
Amethyst handed Peridot her whip. Peridot took off her visor and from her gem pulled out a yellowish-green javelin, which she tied the destabilizer to with the whip. Once she was done, Peridot hid the assortment of weapons she held with her right hand behind her back and yelled, "Hey, you cuprous clod!"
Malachite turned around.
"Nyeeeeeeeeeah!" Peridot said, pulling down her lower left eyelid with her left hand and sticking out her tongue.
Furious, Malachite galloped over to destroy Peridot for the insult. But just before she did, Peridot threw what she had in her hand at the fusion. The assembly struck Malachite in her lower chest. The fusion roared in pain and began to fall over.
Before she had completely done so, though, she saw Steven. "Rose Quartz!" she exclaimed, and swatted Steven with her right arm. Steven was launched into the air and landed on his back. Hard.
"Oww..." he groaned.
A flash of light, and all that was left of Malachite was a teardrop-shaped blue rock and an orange gem that could easily be mistaken for a shard.
"What do we do now?" Pearl asked.
"Bubble Jasper," Garnet said. Pearl did that and sent Jasper's gem to the room where the gems of corrupted Gems were kept. "Keep Lapis unbubbled," Garnet continued. "She's gone through enough. And Peridot?"
Peridot looked at the fusion.
"How would you like to be a Crystal Gem?"
Peridot thought and said, "On one hand, Homeworld won't approve...but on the other hand, I'm not affiliated with Homeworld anymore, so I'll do it."
"You can't be serious," Pearl said, and then noticed Steven was hurt. "Steven!"
The Gems rushed over.
"Ohhh..." Steven moaned. A puff of smoke, and he was gone, all except a pink stone.
"He's been poofed!" Amethyst exclaimed.
"We'd better keep an eye on him and wait for him to regenerate," Garnet said, concerned. "If he regenerates, that is."
"Why wouldn't he?" Peridot asked.
"Steven is half-Gem. His father was a human, and humans can't regenerate. A fall like the one Steven had could kill him, or at the very least paralyze him."
"Was Rose Quartz his mother?"
"Yes. She gave up her physical form to give birth to him. That is how much she loved life on this planet."
Peridot looked at Steven's gem, shocked.
The gold-tinted robonoid, unbeknownst to them all, was detailing everything it saw.