"So….this redemption thing…is it just for humans?"
Drakken hauls in air so deeply he nearly inhales a strand of his own saliva. The question is asked with timidity, the kind characteristic of the Lapis he first met, and yet it has nearly clobbered the breath from his lungs.
"Well, I – I – I –" he postulates. Brilliantly.
Lapis folds her arms around her knees again. The delicate ridges of her elbows stand out as though she has forgotten to steel them. She whispers her next question: "Do I have a soul?"
Drakken is sure his soul sneaks up his throat and chokes any response right out of him. He has the distinct sense that he isn't theologically qualified to answer such a thing, especially given how he can never remember if there are twelve commandments and ten apostles or the other way around.
But there is no pastor around, no one else to abandon the question to.
He can almost hear his Sunday school teacher, the one with the pinched-in nostrils and the skirted suit that sported nary a wrinkle, informing him sternly that nothing that isn't human has a soul. And perhaps she is right when it comes to potato bugs, but a creature like Lapis, who has free will and emotions and conflicted loyalties, is surely an entirely different schematic.
"I – I think so," Drakken says, already praying for forgiveness if he's on the wrong track. "I mean – you have a conscience, right? You have an awareness of your actions."
Boy, does she ever. For all that she is happy now, Drakken still doesn't think she's forgiven herself for the spiriting-away of the ocean, much less her time as Malachite.
The guilt is already weighing Lapis's head down again, he can tell. Drakken scoots closer and rolls his fingers back into his chest; a touch will only make things worse. "Like how you knew you didn't want to fight other Gems?" he ventures. "You knew it was wrong to harm each other. That comes from God, Lapis, even if you didn't know Him."
Lapis raises her head a quarter-inch and studies him through her bangs and the invisible force field in her eyes.
Drakken fingers the space at his chest where the medal would rest if he were wearing it and exhales. "I think anyone who's able to care if they have a soul – I think they would automatically have a soul." He's quick to shrug. "But I don't really have the authority to. . . declare. . ."
Words disappear – not an uncommon event for Drakken – but any noises, mutant stumps of words, are also snuffed out, which is indeed rare. Lapis is still watching him, and the shields have pulled down some. Bathed in multicolored lights, there is a surrender on her face, bare of the feistiness she has so bravely adopted over the last few months.
"Well," she says, softly as ever, "thanks for the input." The corners of her lips tip up, and her elbows relax, and gratitude radiates from her.
And while he is still no master theologian, Drakken can't help but wonder – how could anyone so nice not have a soul?