A/N: I do not own Steven Universe or any of these characters.

I wanted to do this story after looking over Peridot's wikia page. I did a little more research and did find that peridot actually is rarer because it actually degrades when exposed to Earth's atmosphere. Long story short it kind of rusts, I could go into the chemical components but even they're a little above my head since I do organic chemistry and not inorganic. Another idea mixed into this is that gems are replicated, kind of like clone troopers. Pearl is somewhat hinted to be something like this, but I thought it would be interesting if Peridot was the same, since she's so low on the chain of command.

Anyway here's my first Steven Universe fic! Reviews are welcome.

Repair and recall.

It just had to be repair and recall.

She could have gotten saddled with a dull tech job crunching numbers back on the home world, or assisting colonization efforts by helping set up bases; or- in her wildest dreams- developing new technology for the home world with the elite of the elite. She says dreams because there's no way the unluckiest gem of her age, Peridot 013, would ever get anything so ideal.

She hadn't been surprised when the listing came out, no one had been. When it came to chance, to the fates, Peridot 013 always got screwed. Not just in job allocations, but life in general. That was why she preferred data. Simple, sweet data that could be predicted and monitored. Not messy, unorganized reality.

She'd taken the dull, unappreciated clean up job with stride. Going from abandoned planet to abandoned planet, repairing warp pads or other machinery as she went. It was her inventions, the peri-droids that allowed her to actually begin working on worlds without making the long- and often dangerous trips. Looking back she was a little surprised it had gone so well for so long. It figured that her infamous bad luck would rear its ugly head again. Assigning her to check in on some long forgotten experiment on a back water planet. It figured that when she needed reinforcements they sent Jasper of all gems. The stupid hot head with less neurons than dirt. It figured that the mission had gone to shit and she'd crash landed on this clod-awful planet.

Peridot stared up through the suspension liquid up at the crackling screen in front of her. Reading but not really taking in what information the pod was giving her about the crash site conditions. She'd landed in an isolated field, and minimal damage had been sustained. The escape pod wasn't flying into battle or traversing the galaxy's anytime soon, but its primary functions were working. Given her luck she wondered how long that would last. It wasn't the crash landing, or the fact that because of those clods (including Jasper) that had her in such a pessimistic mood. It was the small screen in the upper left hand corner of her visor.

The atmospheric readings.

Gems were unique creatures by far. Strength, speed, regenerative powers, shape shifting. Compared to organic beings they were practically what humans referred to as 'gods'. But deep down they were still gems. Just sentient inorganic material. Inorganic material that still obeyed the laws of the universe. Peridot knew all about those. While other gems had been discovering their magic abilities and had been wasting time fooling around with them, Peridot had been learning how the world ticked, and her place in it. Gems at their core were still just gems, no matter what cool weapons they could summon or fuse with or whatever it was.

None of that mattered, when Peridot degraded in poor conditions. She'd seen it before to other gems of her nature. First it started with the bending of the mind. A slow madness that would sink into their systems. Hysteria, paranoia, delusions- by that point the oxidation would have them turning into a sick brown. On a ship or a colonized planet with regulated atmospheres it took millions of time cycles for the affect to kick in. On a planet like this, it wouldn't even take a handful.

That was why she'd built the drones, made a way to do all this work without going on world. To not be exposed to conditions that would lead to such a fate.

These were prime conditions for degradation to- once again the universe was laughing at little Peridot 013. Peridot warily rubber her gem, recalling it's exact mass and density, and did some quick calculations. About twenty Earth years, not even three full time cycles. Peridot felt like laughing and crying at the same time. She wasn't even out of the protective stasis fluid, and she could already feel the atmosphere eating away at her. That was her imagination though. She hoped.

"Damn it," Peridot lashed out and punched the side of the pod, hurting her fist but doing it again just because it felt good to let out some frustration, "damn it, damn it, damn it all! Why me?! why! Damn it Why?"

The last word nearly came out as a sob and Peridot curled up in the bottom of the spherical ship, not able to hold back the tears. Why was it always her? Out of the what- 345 peridots that had been made in the same kindergarten that she had. The 100 that had been in her training group, the 98 that had survived to get jobs. Why did it have to be her? why was it always her?

"At least I wasn't defective, like 042 and 063 were." Peridot consoled herself quietly. She had that going for her at least. Peridot wiped her cheeks off with the back of her sleeve and sat up, knowing that laying there whining to herself wasn't going to get her very far. The universe wasn't that kind to her.

"Alright, better stop feeling sorry for myself." She muttered, pulling up the console and began pulling up the files of Earth from the ships's remote access hard drive- downloading it into her own. Most gems made organic bodies. Phe- idiots with their limited imagination. They could be anything, and they chose to be meat? She'd stick to her wires and gears thank-you very much, "This maybe the worst thing life's thrown at you, but that doesn't mean you're hopeless. Find your options and get yourself out. You can do this." she said, and began filing through gigabytes of data. She'd skimmed most of this already, but skimming for the sake of getting a fuzzy idea on the planet wasn't the same as finding a way off of it. There were several options she could take, but those crystal-clods would be a hassel no matter what happened. They'd come after her for sure, and she was a sitting duck here. She wasn't a fighter, hell she'd never even pulled a gem weapon before. If she found Jasper she'd have back up... No, probably better to not get involved with him. Or Lapis, since the woman hadn't even wanted to be here in the first place. Let the idiot duke it out with the clods. She'd contact headquarters, get the data she came for and get off this god forsaken hell while he did whatever.

Still, better prepare for the worse since it was going to happen anyway. She accessed her own programming and redirected some energy circuits, forming a sort of cannon in her arms, and brought up that handy propulsion program she'd developed years ago. Those might come in handy.

It took Peridot until the 'sun' as the humans called it rose again until she was done accounting for everything that she could. It took another Earth hour for Peridot to build up the courage to leave the broken pod. She'd set her drones over night to clearing out a large space in the field, a marker in the land for any rescue team. A flare at this point in time would just give away her position to the clods.

Peridot shuddered at the feeling of the planet's atmosphere ghosting across her skin, and activated the peri-copter program. Setting a coarse for the nearest pad other than the one at the gem's base. She held her legs close to her chest partially for balance, and the other part because the wind made her skin crawl.

It was like she could feel the oxidation happening, making her skin tingle. That or she was just skipping a step to paranoia. Either way Peridot needed to get the information from kindergarten while the clods and Jasper had it out. Home World wasn't going to even bother rescuing her unless she had something of value. Best give them something to hurry up about.

A/N: I don't own any of these characters or the universe of Steven Universe.

See what I did there?