Earth Mates

"Ooooh!~

He's a frozen treat with an all new taste!~

'Cause he came to this planet from outer space~

A refugee from an interstellar war~

But now he's at your local grocery store!~"

Steven sang as he picked up his clothes hamper and journeyed from the bathroom to the warp, a pip in his step as he shook his head left and right. It shot him off as he continued,

"Cookie Cat!~

He's a pet for your tummy!~

Cookie Cat!~

He's super duper yummy!~

Cookie Cat!~

He left his family behind!~

Cookie Ca aa… huh? "

Steven ended his singing abruptly when he stepped off the warp pad and saw the blue form of Lapis. She was seated on the end of the temple statue's finger, legs dangling off the edge with her hands resting on her knees peacefully. .

Her head turned to him at lightning speed, but her expression softened when she saw it was just him.

"Lapis, what are you doing here?" Steven asked as he dropped the hamper from his hands in an instant and ran over to her. "I... thought you left."

"I was, but," Lapis flew down and landed in front of him, "Steven, you can't tell the Crystal Gems I'm here." The boy in front of her raised an eyebrow in confusion.

"Wh… but… they wouldn't do that." He didn't take long to get what she meant, clear by the offended look on his face.

"Yes, they would. They would be fools if they didn't. But please, don't tell them." She pleaded while shaking her head, surprising him by getting down on her knees and putting her hands on his shoulders. He looked to the side before nodding, "Okay… but why are you still here? I thought you went back to Homeworld."

Lapis sighed as she stood back up and held her hand on her elbow. "I was… but I knew I would be held prisoner again. They'll see me as a Crystal Gem if they find out I came from Earth," She turned on her feet and paced away, "But if I stay here, the Crystal Gems will hunt me down and trap me."

"They won't do that, we've already let you go twice! I… already said I would stop them... remember?"

A flash of recognition spread across lapis' face, but it fell into unease. "I remember, but they still can't be trusted." She stopped and looked away from Steven while the wind kicked up her hair. "No matter where I go, I'm always trapped."

Steven bit his lip at her words, not able to clear his throat. He couldn't even imagine what that felt like, feeling(or physically being) trapped for so long. But, an idea found him even faster.

"You don't have to feel trapped, you could always travel across space and live with aliens." Steven suggested with a hopeful smile. He wasn't wrong, Lapis did have magical wings and Homeworld was hopefully not the only place in space.

"Steven, this planet is worthless! All there is here is dull rocks, stupid humans, and rebel gems looking to turn every gem here into shards!"

"Hey! First of all, humans aren't stupid! There's a… lot of humans I know who are really smart, like my friend Connie and her mom! And there's so much interesting stuff here! You just need to look for it!"

Steven walked past her and pointed out across the beach, towards the other side of the hill. "Just down there is the most interesting city in the state of Delmarva. If you looked around, you would have plenty of reasons to stay!"

Lapis looked doubtful, her eyes looking at him lazily.

"C'mon! Trust me, it'll be fun!" Steven raised his hands up, and his enthusiasm made Lapis falter and rub her shoulder.

"Steven… I'm not sure about this. I haven't been around gems or humans in millennia."

"Well, you've been around me! I'm human! If you take me as an example, you'll meet tons of nice humans. And… there aren't any other gems besides us, so you don't have to be worried about being trapped."

Lapis turned her head away, her look indecisive. But after seeing Steven's wide smile, she reluctantly nodded, "Fine, show me this place."

"Ayyy! No worries, you're gonna love it." Steven walked close and took her hand, but the blue gem snatched it away not even a second later. He saw her eye him suspiciously, a shadow coming over her eyes. So he backed away nervously, "O-okay, do you wanna use the warp? We'll have to go through the house, and the gems might be in there. Although usually they're not."

"If it isn't safe, I don't want to use it."

Steven nodded before humming, "Then… how do we get down? With… your wings?!" He put his hands on his cheeks as he looked at her with excitement. She frowned as he got close again. "Lapis, you can fly us there! I can get on your shoulders and you can fly us to Beach City."

"I… don't know about my shoulders. I can hold you by the arms?"

"Yeah, that'll work! C'mon, carry me!" He said playfully as he raised his hands up. Lapis hesitantly grabbed onto his large arms and summoned her wings. She took off with a strong flap of her wings, sending them high into the air. Steven felt gravity pull on him, but he was too busy smiling with excitement to care.

"Woooh! Yeah! This is awesome!" Steven yelled out as he watched the hill under them disappear and give way to Beach City. They glided down the hill, Steven's feet almost touching the grass before they pulled up and soared above houses and buildings. Lapis looked at the human structures dotting the settlement, and she had to admit, they advanced their species a little bit. Still, it was archaic compared to the old sights of gem cities she saw.

But Steven looked to be having the time of his life, so she didn't comment on it.

"Oookay! We should start over there, at Funland!" Steven pointed his finger towards a large wooden platform near the edge of the town. Lapis turned towards "Funland" and raised a brow at the strangely shaped structures, which resembled gem buildings more than they did human's. She landed at a large arch that said "Beach City Funland" in big letters.

Steven wobbled on his feet for a second before shaking his head. "Okay, this place was designed to have a good time, so it'll be impossible for you to hate it! Plus, it's next to the ocean, so you'll be right at home!"

Lapis glanced at the ocean nearby and shrugged.

"Now come on, I'll show you around." Steven said with the turn of his heel, heading into the park. Lapis followed behind as her arms weakly hung by her sides. She looked around at all the humans walking next to them, some stopping and watching her. Anxiety twisted her stomach before she realized Steven stopped walking and pointed his hand at a roundish structure with fast moving carts on it.

"Our first thing here is a roller coaster. It's designed to move really fast and… I think either make you throw up, or make you have fun?" Steven touched his chin with his finger. "It's not really for everyone, but if you like having a rush, then it's for you."

Lapis' lips peeled back into a frown. "I don't think I want to try it."

"Then let's go… Oh! I know just the thing!" Steven was already heading to the next attraction, and Lapis caught up with him in time before he stopped and pointed at a box with a bunch of… containers(?) inside it, laid in multiple rows. Weird decorations hung down on its sides, resembling strange creatures.

"This is a game of ring toss! It doesn't require any scary tactics, just skill!" He looked around cautiously before he grabbed a set of three rings and handed them to Lapis. "Here, what you do is throw them at those bottles and try to get as many as you can around them."

Lapis stared at them before she took one and looked over at the rows of bottles. Then, she hung her arm behind herself and weakly tossed the ring at the bottles. It made a short, high-pitched clink as it hit the bottom of the first bottle in the first row. Steven's face fell into a completely dumbfounded frown, his brain trying to wrap around how weak it was. But he wasn't trying to be negative at all, and instead sent Lapis an encouraging smile.

"Here, give it all you got! Don't hold back!" Steven said while raising a fist, and his enthusiasm seemed to work as a small smile traced Lapis' lips.

Then she threw the ring with enough force to crash through an entire row of bottles in a straight line. The sound was terrifyingly loud, each one crying out as it was smashed to glass bits. Steven winced and watched the fragments hit the ground, causing more shattering cries.

" What in the world was that?! " He heard a far away yell, and he turned his head to see Mr. Smiley running towards them. The park manager saw the destroyed bottles and cried, "No! My precious bottles! Who's resp-"

Mr. Smiley took notice of them and angrily shouted, "You two! It was you, wasn't it!"

Steven looked down at the ring in his hand and quickly threw it over his shoulder. "No! It wasn't us Mr. Smiley!" Then he quickly raised his hands at the death glare the man was giving him. "I'm sorry we broke them!"

"Do you have any idea how much those cost?!" He yelled before looking at Lapis and pausing. "Hol' up, I… I've seen you before. You're that… Lacey gem ain't you! You're the one that stole the ocean!"

" Yeah! That is her! "

" That's the lady that took the ocean! "

Steven panicked and stepped closer to Lapis as a crowd of people began surrounding them. "Oh no! This is just like Ocean Town!"

" OCEAN TOWN?! "

The crowd shouted simultaneously, making Steven hit his back against the stand. "It's even worse now!"

Lapis didn't budge from her stop though, instead bringing an arm up above her head and aiming her hand to the sky. The action confused everyone before water began rising from the gaps beneath them. Strands of water twirled and combined as the humans watched in horror, the magic sending fear through their spines. As the horrified onlookers already ran away, the main crowd endured the deadly look of a massive hand of water rising above them.

Then they ran away, leaving pitchforks and lit torches in their wake. Steven looked on with a baffled look, the whole situation short circuiting him. Lapis let the water from the hand fall back down, putting out many of the small fires caused by the torches.

"That should do it." She said while wiping her hands on her dress and frowning in boredom.

"No! That was wrong!"

Lapis looked at the angry boy confused. "What do you mean? They were gonna hurt us!"

Steven faltered and glanced at one of the pitchforks, seeing a gleam in its points. "They… might not have!"

"Steven, I will not stand down anymore. I'm down being trapped." Lapis looked down at him as her fists squeezed hard enough to cause strains in her arms. The boy bit his lip and stepped back, before grabbing at the edges of his neck.

"O-okay! I know a way better place- no, a bunch of better places !"

Lapis looked doubtful, but glancing at the boy's raised arms, she grabbed them and asked where to go next.

Steven was beginning to get worried.

He expected the woods to be a nice enough place, but Lapis had no interest in them(besides the leaves) and he already expected Jersey to be a no-go. But he was running out of places to show her, and the closest one to them was-

"The ocean?"

"Yeah! There's tons of fish to hang out with, and probably cool artifacts to find! You can use your water powers to make yourself a little house too!"

"I don't know, being just in water is really boring." She replied with a shrug, looking down at the blue waves under them. Steven sighed and looked ahead, his anxiety creeping up. Then he noticed something in the ocean, a group of rocks peeking above the water's surface.

As they passed a cloud, he saw the Galaxy Warp in all its dented glory. "Wait! I know it! Go down, Lapis!"

The blue gem looked confused until she noticed the Galaxy Warp and gasped. Her eyes widened a bit before she voiced protests. "Steven, I don't know about that place-"

"I know you don't know, that's why we're looking around! C'mon, fly us down!"

Lapis bit her lip but gathered the will to the fly down to the platform. She landed next to a large crater in the middle of the Galaxy Warp, and let go of Steven's arms to check out the hole. Her feet stopped a foot away from the edge as she looked down. "What… happened?"

Steven stopped next to her and rubbed his elbow, ignoring his shaking hand. "We destroyed the warp." Before Lapis could say anything else, Steven walked away to a broken warp and planted his foot on the first step of it.

"This should be perfect, it's secluded so you don't have to worry about angry mobs, and you're still right next to the ocean if you want to defend yourself." He turned his head and gave a grin. "What do you think?"

"It was here ."

His eyes widened a bit from the deep void that covered Lapis' face. She slowly walked over to him, and he stepped back a bit from her in fear. She stopped at the edge of the warp before bringing her arms up, raising the water from the ocean over the sides of the Galaxy Warp. Steven looked left and right as the water covered the entirety of the platform with a reflective layer. The water creeped onto the warp and Steven noticed a shimmer come from it.

He walked over and looked down at it, realizing it was creating a perfect replica image of the sky. "I spent thousands of years on this warp pad alone," The scene changed to Lapis standing in a large room, gems looking down at her, "I only came here as a replacement once the last Lazuli joined a rebellion.

"My job should have been short, but everything changed when a message went out across the planet. It sent the planet into a lock down, you couldn't escape if you wanted. No one could be trusted, you couldn't know who was a rebel or an ally.

And soon, I got caught in the crossfire. It should've been safe but they appeared so quickly." The scene continued to shift and move along with her story. She was running, about to summon her wings before a large hand grabbed her leg and grabbed her gem. She poofed when they pulled it out, and it showed her gem being placed in a mirror.

"They placed me in that mirror and questioned me. " Where's the rebel base? Show us where you're hiding " I didn't know, and they forgot about me." The scene returned to the Galaxy Warp, showing gems running. "But something happened, they began running away, and they left me behind." A gem dropped her, and another stepped on her gemstone, cracking it. "A bright light engulfed everything… and a song began playing. It stopped, and everything was silent for… so long ." Her voice cracked at the end as she curled her hands into fists.

The water slid off the warp pad, and the entire layer on the Galaxy Warp retreated back into the ocean. Lapis slowly sat herself on her knees as she grabbed handfuls of her dress.

"L-Lapis… I'm sorry that happened to you." Steven said as he stopped and sat down next to her. "You didn't deserve any of that... just because you came to Earth. You weren't even in it."

Lapis let out a sigh as she forced herself up onto the steps to the warp. "Everyone was though, after that message. I wish I never came to this planet."

Steven raised an eyebrow and asked, "What... was the message?"

"Foolish propaganda is what it was! It was sent out by the rebels, and somehow worked!" Her nose visibly flared as she raised her hands up in the air. "It ruined everything!"

"Wait… rebels, do you mean the Crystal Gems? How did it ruin everything?"

"It turned hundreds of gems into rebels, and made everything chaos! You couldn't go anywhere without running into fights. The Crystal Gems… Pink Diamond ruined this colony."

"Pink Diamond? What? But… The Crystal Gems are good! They wouldn't hurt people like that."

"Ha! You really don't know anything about them, do you? The Crystal Gems are horrible!"

"No they're not! They save people from monsters! Homeworld is evil, that's why they left in the first place!"

"You don't know anything about Homeworld do you?! They've brainwashed you into siding with them! It's all over your face!" Lapis said as she glared at him. Steven gritted his teeth and angrily pointed at her.

"They helped you though! Pink's the one who healed your gem, and let you go! You could've gone back to Homeworld, but you stayed here."

"Because of the Crystal Gems!" Lapis yelled as she shot to her feet. "They've ruined everything for me! I can't even go home because of them!" She summoned her wings and shot off the ground, Steven falling on his butt from the force. He looked up and saw Lapis flying in the air, disappearing the farther she got from him.

"Wait! Lapis!" He cried, holding a hand up as he ran after her, stopping at the edge of the Galaxy Warp.

But she was gone.

It had only been an hour, but it already felt like a week.

His head was laid on the kitchen counter above his arms, but his eyes stayed open with unrest. They had guilty tears barely peeking at the edges, but they weren't close to falling out just yet.

' I made Lapis run away. I'm the worst tour guide ever. ' His thoughts ran deeper than that, but he tried to ignore them, no matter how uncontrollable they were.

He had some help when the screen door opened and he turned his head to see who it was. It was Pink, a frown across her lips while her arms were crossed. And the faint sight of something was clenched in her left hand. As subtle as a snake, he turned his head away, trying to go back to doing nothing. But he heard her feet tap against the wooden floor before she stopped next to him.

"Steven, while I was in the city talking to some humans-"

"You mean spying?" He interrupted, knowing it was rude even by his standards. He felt even more guilt join the knot in his gut, but Pink was already spurting out, "No, I was just talking very far away!" She looked away with an embarrassed blush.

"Besides, I want to know why these are everywhere!" She stuck her hand out and Steven looked at the crumbled stack of papers in her hand. He took one and looked down, before his eyes widened.

"Public menaces Lacey and Boy Universe on the loose!?" Steven cried, his hands threatening to tear the paper.

"Yes, and I already talked to the mayor… what's his face... Mayor Dewdrop about this and they've already agreed to take these posters down. Now, I want to know why exactly Lapis Lazuli is standing right next to you. And why it claims you attacked people!"

'We didn't hurt an-" Steven began, rocking off his chair and closing his hands. But he stopped himself as soon as he realized what he was saying. It was too late.

"So you were with Lapis! Steven, you were attacking people?!"

"No! They tried to attack us ! Lapis scared them away, that's all that happened."

Pink's brow knitted together as she frowned and placed her hands on her hips, "Steven, how long has she been back? If she's antagonizing humans, then she can't stay on Earth any longer."

"Wait, hold on! She was just trying to protect us! I wanted to show her around Earth, because she doesn't know where to go."

"She isn't trying to go back to Homeworld?" Pink asked as she raised her brow.

"No… she said she was scared they would take her prisoner again. But Pink, please we can tell the others about her."

"What? Steven, if Lapis is back out there, she can't be trusted. She told Peridot and Jasper our location, what if she decides to tell Homeworld? She's the-"

"She's too afraid to go back! Right now, she just wants to stay somewhere away from everyone." Steven explained, holding his hands out in front of him. "I promised her I wouldn't tell anybody, so please, don't tell Pearl and them."

"Steven, she kidnapped you!" Pink said as her voice rose a bit. Her face grew more despondent. "She was gonna take to H-Homeworld! If she's left alone-"

"She's hurt! You saw how she looked in Peridot's ship, they did something bad to her. Didn't you see the marks on her?"

Pink grabbed the bridge of her nose in frustration and said, "I understand that, but we still need to be cautious about h-"

"And she was abandoned for thousands of years! She showed me what happened during the war, she sat alone for hundreds of years," He didn't notice Pink hanging her head down lower so her bangs covered her eyes. "Wouldn't you be hurt like that if you were left behin-"

"Yes, Steven! I would!" Pink said as she angrily planted her hand on her forehead and brushed her hair back. "But none of this should stop her from being held accountable for her actions!"

The boy frowned at the outburst, before his shoulders slumped slightly. "I thought we were meant to help people. Even people and gems who do bad stuff sometimes."

Pink lowered her hand and gave a heavy sigh, looking at Steven's fallen frown. Once the knot of regret became too much she gave in, placed a hand on her hip, and said, "I won't tell the others about Lapis for now . If Amethyst or Pearl asks, I won't admit to knowing anything about it. But keep an eye on her Steven."

She walked past to the warp and stopped once she was a foot away from it. "If she causes more trouble, I won't hesitate to see her as a threat. But," She looked back at him with a deep frown. "Steven, Crystal Gems don't just fight for gems. We fight for each other too. Lapis has already made her distaste towards us clear. I'll… see you soon." She stepped onto the warp pad and disappeared in the beam, leaving Steven alone.

And he truly didn't know what to think.