CHAPTER THREE

Several hours later, after waking up from another odd Pink Diamond dream, Steven warped into the Kindergarten to look for the others. They hadn't said exactly where they'd be, but it seemed like a safe bet that they'd be somewhere near the underground control room, so he set off in that direction.

Sure enough, he'd only walked a short distance down the path when a drone suddenly zoomed in front of him. "HALT. YOU ARE ENTERING A RESTRICTED AREA. LEAVE NOW OR YOU WILL BE VAPORIZED."

A small red dot suddenly shone upon his chest and he froze. It suddenly occurred to him that he'd only told Peridot to make her security system non-lethal. He hadn't said anything about non-painful. "Whoa, hey, it's me, Steven!" he squeaked, holding his hands up in surrender. "I'm allowed!"

There were a few tense seconds as the drone seemed to contemplate this, then to his relief, the light vanished. "SUBJECT IDENTIFIED AS STEVEN QUARTZ UNIVERSE, SECURITY CLEARANCE RATING: AAA. PROCEED."

"Ooookay... thank you," he said, warily skirting around it. He didn't quite like to turn his back on it in case it changed its mind and kneecapped him or something, so it was almost a relief when it zoomed away and vanished from sight again. Almost. He continued forward, his eyes darting around for any sign of it, and it wasn't until he heard voices that he began to relax. He turned a corner and there were the gems, all looking expectantly in his direction, and soon as she spotted him, Peridot ran to him, a wide grin on her face.

"Steven! What did you think of the drone?" she asked as soon as she close.

"Pretty intimidating," he answered honestly.

"Good," she said smugly, and slipped her hand into his as they walked back to the other gems. "My intention is for it to scare away intruders before resorting to any additional security measures."

"Did you like the laser pointer?" Amethyst called out. "That was my idea!"

"It's not a weapon?" he checked, nudging Peridot as she laughed. "So what are these additional security measures then?"

"Well, there's a camera inside linked to my tablet, so I can observe and judge whether further action is needed," she explained, holding the tablet out so he could see the gloomy walls of the Kindergarten on the screen. "I don't want to waste an electrical discharge on a bird or something."

"A non-lethal electrical discharge?" he checked.

"Of course, that's what you specified," she said, looking mildly offended.

"Buzzkill," Amethyst muttered from somewhere behind him.

"It should be enough to convince most intruders to turn back," Peridot continued, ignoring the other gem. "For the more stubborn interlopers, I have also included a small amount of sleeping gas. Once deployed, we should have plenty of time to come out here and remove them from the area before they wake up. And if any attempt is made to damage the drone, it will self-destruct, releasing further sleeping gas."

That all sounded harmless enough, and Steven relaxed. "Sounds cool."

"It's almost a shame it'll never get used," Garnet said, handing Peridot a spanner.

"Yeah, this place is deader than my collection of fossilized dodo eggs," Amethyst joked. "Seriously, I haven't seen a human here since... well, ten seconds ago when Steven showed up, but other than that, I think I've only ever seen one human here ever."

"That's fine," Peridot said placidly. "The drones are powered by pieces of the broken power source from the control room, they'll run indefinitely. And we can always move them someplace else when we're done here."

"How about the outside the house?" Pearl suggested at once, visibly brightening at the prospect.

"The mailman might have some objections," Garnet pointed out. Then she paused thoughtfully. "Outside the house it is then."

"Not outside the house," Steven said firmly and quickly changed the subject. "So how's it going with the drill? When do you think it'll be ready? Next month?"

"Actually, it'll probably be done by the end of the week," Pearl said, looking at Peridot, who nodded in confirmation.

Steven's mouth dropped open. "Wow, that's fast!"

"Well," Pearl said modestly, "It helps that we've done this once before already."

"It also helps that this time, the escape pod wasn't torn in half," Amethyst added. "I dunno why we didn't think of using a new one the first time round."

"I thought of it," Garnet said mildly. "I just didn't trust Peridot around the wreckage of the ship."

Peridot scowled and looked away. "I suppose I probably would've tried to access the communications system," she admitted. "Or the weapons."

"Can I do anything to help?" Steven asked quickly. "Like fetch a drill head or something?"

"Thank you Steven, but that won't be necessary. Opal can take care of that," Garnet said. "Tomorrow," she added, and placed her tools aside. "I think we're about done here for today."

The others followed Garnet's lead, and after they'd tidied their tools away and secured the drill, they all made their way back to the warp pad and returned to the beach house, where Pearl made straight for the kitchen. "Can I fix you something to eat, Steven?"

"Uhh..." Steven hesitated. "Thanks, but not right now. Me and Peridot are gonna go for a walk."

Peridot looked mildly surprised by this statement, but she allowed Steven to lead her out of the house and down on to the beach, where they walked slowly through the surf, hand in hand.

"So..." Steven said, breaking the silence. "The end of the week, huh?"

"The gems got a lot more work done in our absence than I expected," Peridot admitted. "It doesn't give us a lot of time to prepare though."

"No, I guess not." Steven hesitated, and then opened his mouth to tell her about the hospital bill, but before he could, she started talking again.

"Do you plan to practice while we're working on the drill tomorrow?"

"P-practice?" Steven stammered, taken aback. "What? How?"

"The... same way as last time?" Peridot said, looking as confused as he felt. "By bubbling very large strawberries?"

"Oh." The penny dropped. "Oh! You meant practice sending bubbles!"

"Of course that's what I meant!" Peridot stared at him as he started to laugh. "What else would I have meant?"

"I thought you meant... our vacation..." Steven said between giggles.

Peridot looked blankly at him for a moment longer, then her eyes widened and she started to laugh as well. "Noooo! No, you can't do that to the strawberries!"

His stomach was starting to hurt from laughing so much, so with valiant effort, Steven took a few deep breaths until he managed to get himself back under control, because he really did need to talk to her. The hospital bill obligingly flittered through his brain and he sobered up at once. "Listen, Peridot, about that vacation..." he began, linking his fingers with hers as they began walking again.

"Yes?" she said, smiling hopefully up at him at once.

Steven bit his lip, trying to figure out the best way to break the news. "I... I couldn't ask my dad for the money," he finally said.

"Oh." Disappointment flashed across her face, but it was gone in an instant. "That's OK, there's still time-"

"It wasn't because I was too scared to ask," he interrupted. "It's because the bill for my hospital stay was nine hundred and forty-eight thousand dollars. And seventeen cents."

"What!?" Peridot's mouth dropped open in disbelief. "You're joking me!"

"I wish I was." He shook his head glumly. "But I'd never been in hospital before- heck, I've never even had a regular doctor's appointment, so the cost just never occurred to me. Doesn't help that Lion vaporized something important," he added ruefully. "If I'd known it would cost so much, I... well, I still would've done it anyway, but I might've warned the gems first, y'know, told them not to panic and to keep me at home."

Peridot frowned. "That would've been detrimental to your physical health. They would've done taken you to the hospital anyway."

"Yeah, I guess you're right." Steven sighed. "Well anyway, after finding out it cost almost a million bucks to stay in ICU for a week, I didn't feel right asking for money so we could go away and have sex."

"Hmm." Peridot wrinkled her nose. "Did you consider not phrasing it like that?" Then she gave his hand a gentle squeeze. "It doesn't matter. We don't really need a vacation, we just need some privacy."

Then they both fell silent because of course, privacy had become an increasingly rare commodity recently. Steven racked his brains, trying to thing of somewhere they could go. "What about your room?" he tentatively suggested. Privately he thought it would be too close to the main house for comfort, but they had been able to snatch a few moments alone there in the past. Perhaps if they were quiet...

But Peridot was already shaking her head. "There's no lock on the new door," she said gloomily. "It wasn't considered a priority. To be quite honest," she added, "I think the only reason they installed a new door at all is because I made a point of changing my clothes in the doorway."

Steven grinned. "You could've waited until I was home first."

"They would've locked me in instead," Peridot joked. Then she bit her lip thoughtfully. "What about the bathroom? There's a lock on that door."

"No," Steven said flatly. "I want our first time together to be someplace a little more romantic than the bathroom."

"We could light some candles," she said halfheartedly, then shook her head. "No, I suppose I don't really want our first time to be in the bathroom either." For one thing, it was far too close to the other gems. She could quite easily imagine Amethyst waiting outside to give them a round of applause. "Could we warp somewhere?"

Steven thought for a moment, trying to remember all the places the warp pads led to. "I dunno... they're all ruins or abandoned battlefields and stuff like that. And you deserve luxury, silk sheets and flower petals and a view overlooking a mountainside in spring," he said, going misty-eyed as his imagination started running wild. "And then afterwards we'd go outside and lay down in the grass while light rain falls on our naked bodies as we watch the sun set-"

"While it's raining?" Peridot raised an eyebrow at him. That said, she had to admit his vision did sound appealing, although she wasn't entirely sure where they were going to find a place like that- "Oh!" she gasped, and waved her hands in excitement. "What about your room? The one in the temple?" she clarified as he looked blankly at her. "It can make whatever you want, right? So it should be able to make all of that! Even the sunset in the rain!"

Steven opened his mouth to protest and then closed it again. It would've been the perfect solution if it wasn't for one small problem. "I dunno..." he said again. "I don't trust the room. It seems to do what it thinks I want rather than what I actually say I want. I don't want it to force you do something because it thinks I want it."

"Well..." Peridot thought hard. "What if you told it to only obey your verbal commands? You could even incorporate a keyword, and only commands containing that word could be followed."

"You mean give my room a safe word," Steven quipped.

"The word is 'clod'" Peridot replied at once.

Steven grinned and nudged her fondly. "I guess that could maybe work though? It's always been a bit weird about doing what I want even before it started reading my mind, but maybe a safe word could fix that. But maybe we should test it first before we try and, y'know, do it. Just in case."

"Just in case?" Peridot repeated with a cackle of laughter. "Why, what do you think it'll do, create an audience like your dreams did?"

"Hey, don't laugh, I'm serious," Steven admonished. "Me and Connie once went in there to make up a new ending for Unfamiliar Familiar and it made a whole extra Connie when I wasn't looking and I didn't figure it out for ages. And then she beat me up and sat on me until I finally told the real Connie I'd liked the original ending- stop laughing, it's not funny!"

"Sorry, sorry." Peridot wiped her eyes and tried her very best to stop smirking. "I suppose you have a point, I'd be very upset if the room made another me and you didn't notice. Although..." She started smirking again. "Two Stevens could be fun."

Steven couldn't help laughing at that. "Maybe not. Last time there were more of me, I had to kill them. It's not really an experience I wanna repeat."

"Maybe not then," Peridot agreed. "So... you know your room better than I do. How do you suggest we test it?"

"Hmm." Steven slowed to a halt and stared out at the ocean, deep in thought. "I guess... I could ask it to make a place for us to have a date and we can see-" He broke off. "No, we should decide how far we wanna go before we go in there. I don't want it to make you do anything you don't want to do." He narrowed his eyes and looked down at her. "Is there anything in particular you don't wanna do?"

Peridot smiled and leaned her head against him. "I want to do everything with you. I trust your judgment."

Steven blinked and then grinned shyly. "Wow. I'm honored. Although that's not really very helpful right now," he added under his breath. Peridot might trust him, but he wasn't entirely sure he did. His traitorous mind was already running through a number of increasingly X-rated scenarios and what if the room didn't behave? Really, perhaps it would be safer if he just didn't do anything- "Oh!" He snapped his fingers, suddenly inspired. "What if you just like, show me what you like?"

"Y-you mean..." A dark green blush spread across her face as she tried to figure out if he was really suggesting what she thought he was. "T-touch myself? In front of you?"

"You don't have to," Steven backpeddled at once, feeling his own cheeks starting to burn. "Not if you don't want to-"

"I want to," Peridot blurted out, blushing harder.

Steven's mouth continued moving, but it was several seconds before his voice caught up. "Right! Great!" he squeaked. "Awesome!" He stopped and took a deep breath and tried to think of something a little more productive to say. "So um, when- when do you wanna do this?"

Peridot bit her lip and then smiled shyly. "If we intend to test the limits of the room before the end of the week, we'd better get started as soon as possible, hadn't we?