"I keep coming back to it. The container we took from Topaz, and what she said when we wrestled it from her. Making an army... Seizing Earth... Of course I wouldn't believe it-she's reckless, appalling, and so self-conceited she doesn't seem the conspiratorial type, much less, capable of it. But, it's the serum I keep returning to. It looked wrong. Felt wrong. True, it had been lying for thousands of years, but I couldn't shake the feeling.
"It wasn't nearly enough for a single Gem, but I had to test it for myself. No matter how long I waited, it remained liquefied. I don't know if that's an effect of age.
"Then I checked the injectors in the Beta Kindergarten-they were all dry. The ones from Amethyst's Kindergarten were untouched. I searched for new Gem incubation sites around the Beta Kindergarten where I could but found none.
"I can't decide if Topaz is smart or incredibly stupid, but if she's growing new Gems, then she's going to have to reassess her place here on Earth... or go back to being our enemy."
Garnet broke down the Gem birthing process with words like Serum Crystal and Mineralometallic, but Steven understood it like this: the Gem "soup" is injected into the ground. Some of the "soup" turns into a shell that absorbs the essence from the surrounding earth while simultaneously helping the rest of the "soup" compress to form a Gemstone. Once the Gem is formed it becomes capable of projecting a material body which breaks the shell and excavates itself from its own incubating chamber.
The "soup" taken from Topaz did none of these things, Garnet said, and was barely capable of conducting heat, which, as she told Steven, it certainly should do.
"What Peridot's role in this may be, I don't know. Until I do, I don't hold her accountable for anything. The best case scenario is that my suspicions are getting the better of me, and I hope so. But, per chance they aren't, Steven, we need those photos."
Steven was brought out of his miasma by the sound of Peridot snickering. On her screen was a Seddit page of spicy memes that she hovered over and clicked on to maximize if she deemed it worthy. It was hard for Steven to keep up with her; the image she snickered at was so fleeting he was left out of the joke (something about North Borea? He would never know).
He was examining Peridot when she said, "What's up?"
"Nothing."
Those black and white photos were long gone, replaced by pictures of aliens ("I Believe," one said).
Topaz wasn't home. Steven looked over to her things. Still just those boxes of purloined MP3 players, headphones, and AA batteries, two guitars, a battery-powered amp, her prison-cell bed and her trunk underneath it. If the photos still existed Steven was certain they'd be in Topaz's trunk (the only other place would be in Peridot's desk, but that wouldn't be dramatic enough, nor secure enough, despite the trunk having no lock. It didn't need one and Steven was sure that Topaz knew that).
When asked where Topaz was Peridot replied she didn't know. "I know what she's doing, but not where, specifically. I don't think she knows either. She hasn't been keeping track of that as of late-since residing on Earth, that is. In fact, she stumbled upon this pathetic excuse for a Kindergarten in the first place by accident. But, I digress." She batted the air. "She's out getting more human trinkets again. Don't ask me why. I still don't see much point in it, but... she does it."
"What do you mean?"
She almost slapped Steven in the face, slinging her hand behind her to point. "In there. Under the bed."
"Um..."
"You can look," Peridot assured. "She's not here."
Steven felt all the thoughts and conflicts he's had for the past two years come back to him as the two latches of Topaz's trunk stared him down like gleaming, leering eyes-a monster under the bed-a cryptic gypsy veiled behind a silken purple miasma with jangling wrists of bangles who held the secrets to his future. "O-ok..."
Steven teetered over to the bed, clutching his gut.
Topaz's bed, bare bones, was about as inviting as a coffin and Steven vaguely wondered, it being where the Countess slept, if it smelled like brimstone. The air in the cave was dense and hard to take into his lungs, and Peridot's clacking was the most unwelcome it had ever been.
Steven got down on his knees and gingerly reached for one of the side handles of the trunk. "Don't touch anything inside," Peridot blurted out (sending him to his own coffin soon enough). "Topaz will notice."
Topaz. The one Gem on Earth of whom Steven was most afraid. She didn't make him experience horror, but she was a menace to him. Self-aware Steven deduced it had much to do with his want to connect with her (her wrath was a close second). This wasn't the first time he thought that maybe he cared too much, but now he was about to snoop through her personal belongings, and he didn't stand to think it unreasonable to care about how unnatural this was.
Tenderly Steven tugged Topaz's trunk out from under her bed, careful not to scuff the bottom on her dungeon floor. He was wary to leave even hand prints for his hands were sweating and he wiped them on his jeans repeatedly.
The latches were crusty and Steven felt their metal parts grind as he unhooked each one like they were made of glass. He gripped either corner of the lid and breathed a cumbersome sigh of dissatisfaction.
Steven remembered the sarcophagus from nearly two years ago. That's what came to him when he opened the trunk. It wasn't the fear of being caught or of going against his morals that hit him. It was the fear that he might live to see that thing again.
Steven held his breath as he tried to figure out what he was looking at in the low light. Piled to one side were small linen bags. They were full and lumpy, but Steven couldn't tell what was inside them. The other half of the trunk was empty. Above, the lid had a net pouch in it. Deflated linen sacks were packed in there.
Then Steven started to cry. It wasn't that he was sad or happy, but, rather, that he had kept his eyes open for too long. The radar photos were there in the mesh pouch.
There were so many of them, too. At least two dozen. The one on top facing Steven was black and white with the x- and y-axes. The radar pulses in the image acted oddly like ripples in a puddle, and the dark thing in the middle that the ripples bounced off of looked eerily like the profile of a human body.
"Peridot..." he said, and it was so small. "Peridot...?"
"Mm...?"
Steven shut his eyes to let the stinging go away. "Are you..." He gulped and said, into the trunk, "Are you... growing Gems...?"
He heard her swivel around in her chair. "Huh?..."
Steven faced Peridot from his knees. Her eyes were wider than flying saucers. "Peridot. Are you growing Gems?"
Steven watched as she never took her eyes off him, and when she started to slowly shake her head he knew that whatever she was going to say next was a lie.
"I don't know what you're talking about..."
"Peridot." Steven was not mad at her at all, nor with Topaz. But, his heart was falling. "Then... what are these pictures?"
"Nothing," she said. "Merely scans of topographic composition!" Steven moved aside and Peridot fell to her knees in front of the trunk.
"It looks like someone's buried!"
She huffed and slammed the trunk shut, latched it, then shoved it back under the bed. "It only looks like that, Steven, really, it's nothing."
"You need to tell me if you're growing Gems! You can't hide this forever! Garnet suspects it, too!"
"She needs to mind her own business!" The way she said that was like she slung her words around Steven's neck to choke him quiet. But, she regretted it. She apologized.
Peridot wandered back to her desk and didn't get back in her chair but touched it. Steven was still on the ground. "What's going to happen when they come out?"
Peridot shook her head. "I think you need to go home, Steven, before Topaz gets back..."
He picked himself up then, and went to her. "Ok," he said, "I'll go. But, I have to know... Why are you doing this?"
She sighed. "Because Topaz needs this."
"I don't understand."
"I'm sure you will in time. The process is almost done anyway."
Steven suddenly got sad because, for some reason, he thought of losing Peridot because of this. He cried. "Peridot, whatever happens, I love you."
She faced him with her mouth open. Steven hugged her. She put her arms around him. "Yeah," she said. "Yeah. Love you, too." That only made Steven cry harder.
He didn't know why he thought of losing Peridot. He knew that wouldn't happen. No one involved wanted to hurt her like that. But, as he left for the warp pad, taking a moment to calm down and dry his eyes, he thought perhaps what drove him to think that was that he knew-he just knew-that someone, maybe everyone, was going to get hurt.
...