Tammo and Pasque had crash landed in a dark cavern. The two of them slowly emerged from the broken wreckage of the palanquin.

"Come on, we gotta move!" Tammo said as he took off running into the dark and desolate underground of Homeworld.

Pasque chased after him, calling, "Hang on a tick, you can't just go dashing off like that! Do you even know where you're going?"

Tammo stopped running. "No," he admitted.

Just then, Pasque's stomach rumbled. She hadn't eaten in hours. "I don't know what's gonna happen to me if I don't get some flippin' tucker soon."

"There's tons of food, if you like rocks for dinner," Tammo joked weakly. "Salt is a rock, right? Maybe we could season some dirt and make a meal."

"Did you hear something?" Pasque said suddenly.

Tammo turned around. He saw a giant robot coming at them! "Aghhh! They've found us! Run!"

"Maybe if we stand perfectly still it won't see us," Pasque said.

The robot beamed a red light at the hares and began scanning them. It scanned Pasque first, but as she wasn't a Gem it didn't detect anything. Then it scanned Tammo, and detected Tammo's gemstone under his shirt. The robot began beeping frenetically, and started charging an energy beam to fire at Tammo! Just as it was about to blast him, Pasque picked up a rock and hurled it at the robot. It hit the robot right in its sensor, and the robot exploded!

"Thanks, Pasque," Tammo panted.

But then more robots started to appear, scores of them! Tammo and Pasque fused into Tasque so they could fight the robots more efficiently. They punched and kicked one robot after another, smashing them. But there were far too many robots for Tasque to overcome them all. Soon, they had to take to their heels and run, with the robots pursuing them.

The robots were gaining on them when suddenly they heard a voice call, "Quickly! Down here!"

Tasque looked down and saw a hand pointing out of a hole in the ground, beckoning them over. They quickly jumped down into the hole before the robots could catch them.

They found themself standing face to face with a strange looking red Gem, who appeared to have two heads. "Who are you?" one of the heads asked.

"You certainly don't look like any Gem we've seen before," the other said.

Tasque unfused back into Tammo and Pasque. "That's because I'm only half-Gem, and she isn't a Gem at all," Tammo said. "Allow us to introduce ourselves. My name is Tammo Quartz Tussock, and this is my lovely wife Pasque Valerian."

Pasque made a curtsey. "I say, thanks awfully for saving us, you chaps... or are you only one chap? I can't quite tell."

The heads began speaking in chorus, finishing each other's sentences.

"We're..."

"Just a Rutile that came out wrong. We survived because..."

"All the other Rutiles ran away when we emerged. We survived..."

"Because they were afraid of us."

Tammo nodded his head. "I see, so you two are like conjoined twins, wot."

The Rutile twins turned and started walking away, beckoning Tammo and Pasque to follow them. "Come, this way!" one said. "This way, come!" the other agreed.

The hares followed the Rutiles down a long dark tunnel. "Umm," Tammo said. "Excuse me, but, umm... where are you taking us?"

"Somewhere..."

"Long forgotten. Where only those who don't belong..."

"Belong."

"That sounds ominous," Pasque whispered to Tammo.

When they reached the end of the tunnel, they emerged into a big open space, surrounded by cliffs that were filled with holes.

"What is this place?" Pasque asked.

Tammo knew. "It's a kindergarten! A really, really, big one!"

"Yes," said the Rutiles. "This was..."

"The first kindergarten ever made. It's..."

"Long forgotten now."

The twins both whistled loudly. "We're back!" they called in unison. "Here we are! It's okay to come out!"

A Gem emerged from one of the holes in the cliff face. She looked like a fusion of a Ruby and a Pearl. "Oh, thank goodness," she said. "I hope you weren't followed!" She saw Tammo and Pasque, and gasped in fright. "You were! Oh, no!"

Tammo walked over to her. "Uh, hi," he said. "Don't worry, we're not a threat or anything."

"It's okay, Rhodonite. Relax. We brought them here," said the twins.

"Can we trust them?" Rhodonite asked.

"You can trust us all right, true blue an' never fail!" said Pasque.

Then another Gem came out of the tunnel Rhodonite had just exited. She looked like a Sapphire but she was yellow. "Everyone! A wondrous prediction has come before me! The twins of Rutile will bring back one, no, two strangers to our current place of hiding!"

Rhodonite rolled her eyes, of which she had four. "We know, Padparadscha, your prediction already happened!"

"They were being chased by those terrible Robonoids!" said the Rutiles.

"Don't tell me you tried to fight those things," said Rhodonite.

"No, no, of course not. These two were about to be scanned when we pulled them under. We were just in time."

"Let me see," a deep voice said slowly.

Tammo and Pasque turned around and saw another fusion behind them, but this one was a fusion of six different Gems. She resembled a giant caterpillar. "Here comes Fluorite!" Padparadscha said.

"They don't look like Gems," Fluorite the giant fusion said, still in that same slow manner.

"I'm a Gem," Tammo said. "Well, half Gem and half hare. But Pasque is just a hare. We're from a planet called Earth."

"Ah. That's why you look so unusual."

Rhodonite nodded. "You're off-color, just like the rest of us."

"What do you mean, off-color?" Tammo asked.

"You know, wrong," said the Rutiles. "Not right. Flawed."

Tammo frowned. "Can't say I see anything wrong with you chaps."

"We're all defective," said Padparadscha. "I was supposed to be a Sapphire, but I came out wrong. Instead of being able to see the future, I can only predict things that already happened."

"And a fusion like me is unforgivable," said Rhodonite. "The Diamonds don't like it when different kinds of Gems fuse with each other. But my story's nothin'! I mean, Fluorite, how many Gems are you now?"

"Six," said Fluorite. "Maybe more... if we meet the right Gem."

"So you've all been hiding your whole lives," said Pasque. "What happens if they find you?"

"We'll be... shattered," said the Rutiles.

Suddenly, Padparadscha said, "Oh my!"

"What?" Pasque exclaimed.

"Something incredible is going to happen!" Padparadscha said. "I see a strange spaceship, shaped like a giant saucer, landing on Homeworld! And it's going to be full of creatures who look like these two!" She gestured at Tammo and Pasque.

"Are there going to be any Gems aboard?" Tammo asked.

Padparadscha concentrated hard. "Yes! There's an Amethyst, a Pearl, and some red fusion I don't have a name for!"

"She's talking about our friends!" Tammo said to Pasque. "They came to rescue us!"

Pasque nodded. "And since Padparadscha sees things that have already happened, they must already be here! All we have to do is find them and we're saved!"

Tammo turned to Padparadscha. "See? You're useful after all. Don't let anybeast ever tell you otherwise."