Chapter 1: Too Cool to Play

post - Too Short to Ride

Lapis closed her eyes, sighing contentedly into her solitude. This is what she had been imagining when Steven said she could stay here on Earth. Peace and quiet. Space and time to let all the bad thoughts and unsettling desires in her head drift out and settle…

"Lazuliiii!" Hey Lazuli!"

Lapis groaned.

"LAAAAAZZZUUUULLLIIIII!" The entire silo seemed to shake from the force of her roommate's yell. Something heavy-sounding crashed to the ground. "Whoops!"

Lapis peered over the edge of the silo, eyes narrowed at her "roommate" as Steven (and increasingly, said Gem herself) had been referring to Peridot. To her dismay, Peridot was alone and she was beckoning her over to the barn.

Lapis spread her wings, already resigned to a conversation. Ignoring Peridot only made the smaller Gem try harder.

Peridot beamed as the blue Gem swooped down to the ground beside her. "Hi Lazuli!" She said cheerfully.

Lapis folded her wings away and crossed her arms. "You can call me Lapis you know…" She muttered but her roommate was practically bouncing with excitement.

"Lazuli! Look, Look!"

The tiny Gem was clutching some kind of humanoid toy to her chest that was nearly the size of her. A human electronic device floated at her elbow.

Peridot grinned at her. "Noticing anything…different?"

"Ummm…" Lapis looked her up and down several times, the toy catching her attention. "…Steven gave us another roommate?" She guessed.

Peridot hugged the thing tightly. "Well, yes. But there's something else!"

She carefully placed her friend on the ground, then turned back to Lapis with her eyes shining.

"Look! Watch!" She focused intently on a pile of metal cans in a heap alongside the barn, throwing both of her hands towards them. Nothing happened.

Peridot's smile slipped slightly. "Wait…hold on…I can control metal!" She shifted her stance and tried again. Not a single can moved.

Lapis raised an eyebrow.

Peridot chuckled self-consciously. "Well…" She pointed at the rectangle floating at her elbow. "I can do this pretty easily." She threw a glance over her shoulder. "And I moved that before you got down here…"

Lapis noticed that the old "car" — as Steven called it — was now over on its side, as if someone had deliberately tipped it over.

"So waddaya think? Isn't it…snazzy? 'Ay, Lazuli?" She grinned hugely, much like she had when she'd been trying to convince Lapis she really had changed. Lapis had to admit, when she first met "Peridot Facet 2F5L Cut 5XG", she'd never imagined her speaking like this.

Lapis just shrugged. "All Peridots can do that."

Her roommate's face crumpled instantly. "They can?"

Lapis nodded. "Yeah." She said drily but with little bite.

Peridot caught the rectangle from the air, holding it uneasily in her hand. "But…but I never saw one do it on Homeworld…" Her shoulders were scrunching up.

Lapis sighed, unhappy thoughts assaulting her. "Homeworld changed a lot. They probably just didn't tell you that you were capable of this." Her gaze darkened. "Homeworld lied about a lot of things."

Peridot scratched the back of her head, remembering the records that had falsely reported the absence of Gems on Earth. "Yeah…" She agreed. "They did."

Silence descended for a moment, Peridot looking like she wanted to go crawl off on her own. Even though Lapis valued those moments when Peridot chose not to pester her, she didn't feel like she should leave their conversation at that. "…I've never heard of an Era 2 Peridot discovering that ability though." She offered.

Apparently that had been the right thing to say. Peridot's grin returned with a vengeance. "neheehe. Yeah, I almost didn't. But then Amethyst gave me this talk about focusing on what I could do…" Peridot blushed deeply, "…and tried to destroy my only piece of tech and it just kinda…burst out of me."

Lapis paused, an unexpected sense of camaraderie with Peridot stealing past her careful block on her emotions. In spite of herself, she couldn't help a small warm feeling starting in her chest. She said nothing, letting Peridot continue.

The green Gem was flexing her fingers carefully. "It's kind of like…an enormous, complicated array of strings connecting me to the metal…and how I move…" A pipe shifted and rolled off the rack alongside the barn with a clang. Peridot jumped in surprise. "…the metal responds…"

"Controlling water is similar."

"Huh?"

Lapis held out her hand. "It's all in your head. But you're trying to force it out anyway you can." She held her hand out to the pool. Immediately, a large column of water rose up, straight and flawless. "You just have to get out of your head and feel it."

"Okay…" Peridot raised her hands toward the pipes. "FEEEEELLLL it." She closed her eyes and grunted. The pipes didn't move. But the car lifted effortlessly into the air.

"Nice." Lapis said, nodding at the hovering vehicle.

Peridot cracked open her eyes, seeming surprised that the car was float.

"Uhh yes! I meant to do that…" She took a step back and the car rose up even higher. "Now…let's see if I can…GAHH!"

Something had found its way under her foot, something small and round and unstable, sending the less-than-graceful Peridot tumbling to the ground.

Above their heads, the car responded accordingly. But instead of crashing down on top of them, it flung itself forward…right into the attic of the barn.

Peridot and Lapis stared at it with wide eyes, expecting that it would fall or the entire barn would crumble to bits from such an assault. But the truck seemed to have wedged itself into the structure quite comfortably and sat at a slight angle, trunk bed sticking out.

They exchanged looks.

Lapis put a hand over her mouth but she couldn't contain the snort. Her mirth spilled over, morphing into full-fledged belly-shaking laughter that had her doubling over.

Peridot was blushing a deep blue but she slowly loosened up, her own breathy laughter hesitantly joining Lapis'.

"I like it." Lapis declared. "Let's keep it."