Orange Pearl
Even though it was late in the Cycle and most Gems were on their rest period, the main hall of the Silver System's Central Communication Hub still thrummed with activity. Emeralds, calcites, spinels, ulexites, peridots, and beryls all hurried along, intent on their personal orders, duties and destinations.
No one paid any mind to a single Pearl making her way through the crowd. Barely anybody noticed when she crashed right into a Coral, sending the pair of them to the floor— except for those who cursed their clumsiness as they were forced to step around them.
"Watch where you're going!" the Pearl hissed at the Coral.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" The Coral scrambled to help the Pearl pick up the tablets she'd dropped in the crash. The Pearl pulled them from her impatiently. The Coral winced. Without another word, the two went off in their separate directions.
Only once she was out of the main hall and had turned the corner did the Pearl risk looking through her tablets. They were all there, along with something extra. Buried among them was a security pass.
Behind her veil, the Pearl smiled.
She paused only briefly to tuck the pass underneath the sash at her waist, then carried on with her errands. Deliveries. She made quick work of them, expertly navigating the confusing labyrinth of tunnels, until each tablet was dropped off with their new owners. By then it was truly late into the Cycle. Practically everyone was either in their quarries or private chambers.
But the Pearl walked on.
Now she was in the back halls, the service corridors, the storage areas, the places where the logs and hard-drives were kept. The automatic monitoring systems. She walked down the corridors quickly, but not too quickly. The place seemed empty, but if anyone did notice her, she needed to look as though she belonged.
Many times this Pearl had cursed the veil had made her regenerate in. The thing was sheer and pretty, but it itched her nose and got in her eyes. Just now she was glad for the fashion. Less chance of her expression giving her away. Less chance of being recognised on camera.
Not that that would be a problem, the Pearl reminded herself. One of the rebellion's peridots should have turned off this entire grid's surveillance system, under the pretence of 'scheduled maintenance'. The cameras were out. She was in the clear.
For a little while, at least.
The Pearl walked a little faster.
She stopped halfway down a corridor which seemed identical to the last five. The walls were all covered in plain blank panels, like every hallways in this area, and this panel appeared no different than the others. The Pearl only knew there was anything there because she'd been informed in advance, and had been carefully measuring the distance the whole way.
The Pearl reached into her sash and pulled out the stolen security-pass that the Coral had slipped her. She pressed it against the panel. It glowed with bright blue light; a door appeared. Pearl went inside.
The room was surprisingly large due to existing on a trans-dimensional plane. The very space hummed with energy. The walls were lined with monitors and controls, mounted on hard-drives, huge and black like obelisks, build for Gems a good third taller than pearls. The Pearl may have lacked both the size or technology to reach them, but she didn't need to. The Gem behind her neck glowed, and the Pearl reached behind her veil to pull out a data-chip from it. She pressed the chip against the side of the huge hard-drive. It instantly connected and by-passed all security protocols. Then it began the process of downloading and decrypting the drive's entire contents. This part wasn't instant. Pearl had to count down from one hundred, her nerves screaming the entire time.
The moment she finished her countdown and reached one, she pried the chip away and stored it back in her gem. Then she pulled out two other devices. Where the chip had been small and sleek, these were large and bulky. One was roughly cylindrical in shape, haphazardly constructed, with a long string hanging out of one end. The other object was ornate, and so ancient that it was practically antique. An old Fire Starter, created for some long-dead member of Yellow Diamond's court who had considered ruby-powered objects too dangerous to keep on her person.
The Pearl fed the string into the mouth of the Fire Starter. With a mental twitch it flared to life. The end of the string burned orange. Quickly the Pearl placed the cylinder on the floor and stored the Fire Starter away. The fuse continued to burn. Slowly enough, but once it reached the end of the fuse…
It was a crude technique, but an effective one.
The Pearl allowed herself a quick smirk. The she grabbed the stolen security pass and got out of there.
oOo
Incident Report: Number 24Beta-X15-0001
Time: 142:15, Cycle 20, CentCycle120K, Era 2
Summary: Fire in Silver System Planet Communication Database Station #41
Damage: Station's hard-drive destroyed with 1.2% chance of data-recovery. Minor damage sustained to neighbouring communications stations.
Casualties: 0
Cause: Suspected technical failure. Full investigation pending.
Additional Note: Sodalite-P69-12 was recorded signing into Station #41 16 Units prior to Incident. Sodalite-P69-12 claims that she was not present, and that at 141:99 she was in fact resting in the Sodalite Quarters in Sector 24L. Claim is highly suspicious, but cannot be either verified or discredited due to scheduled maintenance of camera systems during this period. Sodalite-P69-12 has been reprimanded and will be monitored for suspicious activity.
Response:
-Station #41 hard-drives to be salvaged and repair attempted. Station #41 itself to be rebuilt.
-Peridots to be deployed to adjacent Communication Stations for repair and to investigate for signs of imminent technical failures of similar nature.
-All sodalites are to be reminded to back up system hard-drives a minimum of every three Cycles.
oOo
Author's Note: My nickname for this one is 'Arson'.
I was talking with LadyRavenEye about how I wanted a term for large-scale quarters for the lower ranking Gems who don't qualify to have their own private chambers. Something akin to 'dormitories', but without the implication of sleep. She suggested 'quarries'- a slang shortening for 'quarters', with bonus rock puns.