CHAPTER 34: FREE AT LAST
"Please… please just shatter me… I can't take this anymore… please I'm begging you!" The pearl cried.
"Blue…" Lapis murmured as she softly touched the crying gem's shoulder who raised her gaze towards her.
"L-Lapis?" Blue whispered as she raised her hand and slightly brushed Lapis's cheek.
"It's me Blue, don't be scared…" Lapis said placing her own hand on Blue's one.
"Lapis!" Blue yelled as she tightly embraced the gem, letting her tears fall freely.
"Do you know this gem?" Black asked moving behind her and cutting the chain with a powerful slash.
"Being an aristocratic and well, Blue Diamond's 'daughter', I was often around her, and around Blue, I was the only one allowed to speak to her, I couldn't wander freely or talk to every gem so, we ended up being each other's only friend…" Lapis said stroking the blue pearl's hair, trying to calm her down.
"Please tell me you're really here…" Blue said between hiccups.
"What have they done to you?" Lapis asked as she freed the pearl from her collar.
"She… Yellow Diamond… s-she k-kept coming and coming a-and coming, every day s-she would come here and, a-and torture me in front of t-that mirror… s-she made me… s-she… oh please Lapis forgive me! She made me shapeshift into you and tortured me i-in front o-of that m-mirror to make h-her suffer e-even m-more… I didn't want to! She said she would have broken her if I didn't! P-please f-forgive me…" Blue said as she kept crying.
"Shhhhh, it's not your fault Blue, this ends now… can you stand up?" Lapis asked, Blue nodded and they both stood up, Lapis supporting the weakened gem.
"What are you going to do?" Black asked as Lapis moved towards the desk and took the mirror in her hands.
"I'm going to make her free…" Lapis said as she turned the mirror around and placed her hand on the great, rhomboidal gem embedded in it.
As Lapis started to pull, cracks began to spread on the surface of the mirror, soon, she would have met her mother again, would she still remember her? Would she help her? Millions of doubts began to assail Lapis's mind as the gem was finally detached from her prison, a bright light engulfing it. A massive silhouette began to form around the blue gem, a long, blue cloak covering it. After some moments, the massive, fully formed gem, was laying on the ground, breathing heavily. None of the gems knew what to do, Lapis was the first one to move, she moved towards the gem and kneeled in front of her. Sensing a presence, Blue Diamond immediately raised her head, only to meet Lapis's face, already stained with tears.
"Lapis… m-my dear, dear Lapis…" Blue Diamond whispered placing her hand on Lapis's cheek.
"I'm here mother… I came back for you…" Lapis said taking her mother's hand with hers.
"I was a-afraid I would n-never see you again…" Blue Diamond said showing one of her rare smiles.
"Me too!" Lapis cried in happiness.
"W-what are you d-doing here?! Yellow Diamond might come back at any moment now, you must escape!" Blue Diamond said as she started to stand up.
"Mother please you have to listen to me!" Lapis said, she knew she and the others would have never been able to escape without her help, she needed Blue Diamond to know what was happening, so she told her about the Earth, how she met Rose Quartz's offspring, how Steven healed her gem and allowed her to return home, how she saved him and the rebels fusing with a Jasper and chaining her at the bottom of the ocean, how she joined the Crystal Gems and was captured by Yellow Diamond and White Diamond, how the Homeworld's leaders wanted to execute her and her friends and how now she needed her mother more than ever.
"Lapis…" Blue Diamond said, Lapis didn't know what she would have said to her, she had just revealed her mother she has taken part of the rebellion and now asked for her help to fight the Diamonds.
"Mother please! I'm begging you! You have to help us… without you we will never be able to return home… I understand this goes against who you are but-" Lapis was silenced by a large finger which covered her mouth.
"I lost you once… no one will take you away from me ever again… and don't talk to me as if I still am part of the Diamonds… when Yellow Diamond imprisoned me in the mirror, she and White told my armies that I had been destroyed by the rebels, so that they could gain and add my soldiers to theirs, avoiding a revolution… this will change now… my gems might be less numerous than White and Yellow's ones… but I have a plan… go reach your friends Lapis… I have a score to settle with both of my sisters…" Blue Diamond said as she gestured her pearl to follow her.
"Promise me you'll stay safe." Blue said holding Lapis's hands.
"I promise… stay safe too." Lapis said hugging the pearl.
"Pearl, let's go, I'll need your assistance…" Blue Diamond said as Blue started to follow her.
"W-wait! What are you going to do?" Lapis asked, her mother was still weak from her imprisonment, she couldn't have defeated two diamonds on her own, but this wasn't Blue Diamond's plan.
"Don't worry Lapis… I'm still a Diamond gem, I'll be safe, now go!" Blue Diamond said as both Lapis and Black started to run away from Yellow Diamond's chamber.
"Good luck my dear…" Blue Diamond whispered as she too left the room alongside Blue.
Meanwhile:
"Peridot! How much 'till we reach the reactor?!" Garnet said as they all ran through Yellow Diamond palace's corridors, the yells of the guards becoming nearer and nearer behind them.
"A few hundred meters!" Peridot answered tapping frenetically on her holographic interface.
"I hate this palace!" Steven said, his shirt almost completely soaked in sweat.
"Is there any chance we could manage to slow them down?!" Jet asked.
"No! I can't… wait! Not far from here, there's an emergency shut door, it should be strong enough to hold back those guards enough to allow us to escape!" Peridot said, they just had to reach that door and they would be safe.
"Traitors!" A quartz yelled from behind them, it was getting nearer and nearer to the group.
"Oh gosh oh gosh oh gosh!" Steven yelled, the quartz had almost reached him, her hand was stretched forward, ready to catch him, instead of being grasped, Steven heard a loud yell, Black appeared from another corridor and slammed the quartz into the near wall, thrusting her with her sword.
"Guys! You're back!" Steven shouted happily as Lapis and Black began to follow the others.
"Did you manage to do what you had to?!" Pearl asked as Lapis reached her side.
"Yes, we just have to wait for her help!" Lapis said as all of the gems slightly turned their heads towards Lapis.
"Who is going to help us?" Jasper asked suspiciously.
"Blue Diamond…" Lapis answered gaining a gasp from each of the gems.
"Blue Diamond?!" Peridot shrieked in disbelief.
"I freed her, Yellow Diamond had captured her during the rebellion, she tricked her armies into believing the rebels had destroyed her, she told me she's going to help us, we just have to resist until that help comes!" Lapis answered, no one really believed another diamond would really help them, maybe Lapis, since her bond with the gem matriarch, but them? Rebels from the Rose Quartz's rebellion?
"Just trust me! She will help us!" Lapis said as they reached a long, straight corridor at the end of which a large, opened door could be seen.
"That's the security door!" Peridot said as all of them ran as fast as they could, safety was at reach of hand… there was only one problem, it would have had a cost.
"No… no! Damn it!" Peridot yelled punching the wall.
"What's wrong?!" Lapis asked, they couldn't stop for long, the quartzes were near.
"It's a safety door! It can only be closed and opened from the inside!" Peridot could feel a trail of tears running down her cheeks, they would have never outran the guards, not all of them, without this door, they wouldn't have survived.
"We can still reach the hangar! I'll carry Steven come one!" Jet said raising Steven from the ground.
"Come on!" Garnet said as everyone rushed across the door, everyone but one gem.
"Black? Black what are you doing?!" Pearl shouted as she noticed Black was following them… she was staying in front of the door's panel.