Sunday Morning, Pearl is leaving the temple to meet up with Mayor Dewey for a last minute campaign session before the first debate. Steven is enjoying his morning cereal and waves goodbye to Pearl.
"I'm heading out, Steven." Pearl says as she opens the door.
"Bye Pearl!" Steven says with a mouthful of food.
"Steven. Don't talk with your mouth full!" Pearl states.
As Steven apologizes, Pearl notices that the morning paper has arrived. She picks it up and sees Lapis and some children on the front page. She smiles and sets the paper down on the windowsill.
"Steven. Can you make sure that Lapis and Peridot get this morning's paper. I think they're going to be pleasantly surprised." Pearl says with a smile.
"Ok!" Steven says with another mouthful of cereal.
Pearl groans in frustration and leaves.
Later, at the barn. Steven is sitting on the couch sprawled out with a look of exhaustion and frustration. Lapis is sitting next to him just smiling a sly smile, transfixed on Peridot who is currently holding the newspaper and is angrily stomping around in a circle.
"This is preposterous! A travesty!" Peridot says angrily as she smacks at the newspaper with her left hand.
Steven groans. "Peridot... Can you just give it a rest!"
"I will do no such thing!" Peridot angrily replies. "Its utter nonsense! A common feline does not have the capacity for speech!"
"Peridot... Its a comic." Steven says annoyed. "Just let it go!"
Before Peridot can respond Lapis chimes in with a grin, clearly egging Peridot on further. "Maybe the cat isn't talking?"
Peridot stops in her tracks and thinks for a moment. "You may be right, Lazuli." Peridot says more to herself than to Lapis. "Yes. This John is clearly suffering from delusions brought on by insanity caused from a lifetime of isolation! That's the only logical explanation! But to have no contextual evidence in the narrative? Not everyone has the mental capacity to infer such a scenario! It needs to at least be subtly implied! Clearly the writer of this comic needs to learn from the superior technique of Canadian Entertainment!"
Peridot continues to go on and on about the subtle narratives within Camp Pining Hearts and how Garfield can develop into a much better comic strip if it were to follow the narrative styles of CPH. Every so often Lapis chimes in and feeds the fuels of Peridot's frustrations.
Steven groans. "How does she come up with all this!?"
"Its subtext, Steven!" Lapis says with a sly grin and a tone of voice mocking Peridot.
Steven just stares at Lapis in shock and annoyance. She was intentionally goading Peridot on and was loving it. Lapis simply meets Steven's shock with a smile.
While this fiasco is going on at the barn, Pearl and Dewey are in Campaign HQ playing chess. Dewey is white and Pearl is black.
"How did this happen!?" Dewey partially says in shock. "She made the front page!"
"Yes, she did." Pearl says calmly as she moves her bishop to take a pawn. "Give credit where credit is due. It was an excellent campaign strategy. A much better move than your last commemoration."
"Hey! That was the best synthetic wood park bench a modest budget could buy!" Dewey states defensively. He moves a rook and takes Pearl's bishop.
"Clearly." Pearl says as she rolls her eyes. Her knight takes that rook. "I suggested that we play chess as a way to calm down. Stop thinking about Peridot's strategy and focus on your own."
Dewey takes a deep breath and tries to calm down. He moves his queen out onto the battlefield. "I just don't get how this is happening. I've been mayor for years! She has no political experience whatsoever, and the polls are split!"
"Lapis has an odd charisma about her." Pearl says as she moves her king up a square. "She steals the ocean, threatening economic stability, and yet the people still love her."
"And that's why I'm scared!" Dewey says. "Charisma is very dangerous in politics!" He moves his queen. "Check."
"Just stick to your platform, and you'll do fine." Pearl says reassuringly. She takes the queen with her other bishop. "Check."
"The debate is tomorrow!" Dewey says as he moves his king out of check. He notices Pearl smile. "Do you know something I don't?"
"Well first. I just won the game." Pearl says as she moves her queen. "Checkmate... Second, Peridot's never read the Sunday paper before."
((Ever since I first watched Code Geass, I can't help but think of chess as the official game of the mastermind. But yeah. The parties are about to go head to head! How will that turn out, I wonder?
Sorry for the longish time between chapters. Life got really busy really fast. Easter was nice but busy. Then we had an incident at work. That lasted until I left for Zenkaikon. There, the Larp took most of my time. I had a blast at the Larp. Was nominated for best Larper, so I believe that I did the little green space dorito justice. Didn't win, but that's not important. Ran into a phenomenal Pearl and Amethyst duo. They gave me alot of ideas. Also, together with a Mr Freeze we did much shenanigans. Now I have to deal with the work I missed... Oh joy.))