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An eerie silence hangs over them as the Off Colors walk through the winding tunnels of the Kindergarten. Rhodonite wrings her larger set of hands together, glancing all around as though expecting an attack. And Lars doesn’t blame her; after living here for the past few weeks, he knows that getting ambushed is more than a bit likely. The Rutile twins walk on his other side, chatting to each other in whispers, so he doesn’t catch most of what they are saying. Fluorite follows behind them all, moving at her usual slow pace. And Padparadscha walks along just in front of Lars, floating slightly off the ground and looking as adorably vacant as usual.
They’ve never ventured down this particular tunnel before, and no one knows what they’re going to find. Or, indeed, if anyone is going to find them. Which explains why Rhodonite keeps pestering them about turning back.
“I just think it might be safer if we go back,” she says, all four of her eyes too wide. “We might run into more robonoids.”
“Yeah, but they might find us anywhere,” Lars says. Of course, he’s scared of them too – after all, it was a robonoid that caused his (temporary) death – but if they just act scared of everything, they’ll never get anything done.
“We can always… turn back at any… signs of danger,” Fluorite says slowly, reaching out with one of her many limbs and patting Rhodonite on the shoulder.
Lars nods, but bangs his foot on a protruding rock and stumbles forwards. He winces.
The Rutile twins flinch. “Did you hear that?!”
“Hear what?” Rhodonite shrieks. “Hear what?!”
“That noise,” Lefty says, and righty adds, “It was really close.”
“Sorry, guys, that was just me,” Lars says, sitting down and pulling his shoe off. “I stubbed my foot.”
Rhodonite sighs in relief, crouching down beside him. “Are you hurt?”
Padparadscha gasps, turning around. With him sat down, they’re the same height. “Human Lars, are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine,” he says. Lars flexes his toes, but there doesn’t seem to an injury. He wonders if this is because of his weird new body now. “I just tripped.”
Padparadscha smiles and holds out her hand. He takes it and she squeezes his hand. “I’m glad you aren’t hurt, Human Lars.”
Smiling, Lars puts his shoe back on and stands up. He looks at all of the Off Colors, all of them so concerned for his wellbeing. They really are awesome friends.
“Come on,” he says. “Let’s keep going.”
The group carry on walking down the dingy tunnel. After another period of silence, Padparadscha stops walking so abruptly that Lars bumps into her.
“Pads?” he says. “What’s up?”
“Padparadscha?” Fluorite says.
She gasps. “I’ve had a vision!”
“What is it?” Rhodonite asks.
Lars smiles. He loves it when Pads does her ‘past visions’, and he thinks it’s really sweet how all the others just accept her. Well, it would be pretty hypocritical if they didn’t accept her for the gem she is, given that they’re literally called the Off Colors.
“A robonoid will spy on us without us noticing, leading us down a dead end…” she trails off.
“It’ll shatter us!” Rhodonite cries, and she covers her eyes with all four of her hands.
As the others (apart from Fluorite, who always manages to) freak out, Lars stares at Padparadscha. All of her visions are things that have already happened. So that means…
“Wait,” he says. “If what Pads has seen has already happened, it means we’ve been being followed for a while. A robonoid is really here, spying on us.”
He looks at the Rutiles, and then Fluorite. They nod at him, and he swallows hard.
“Everyone get down!” Lars yells, and the rest of the group lay on the floor (with Rhodonite grabbing a rather confused Pads to get her onto the ground).
And Lars takes a deep breath and runs back in the direction they came from. He reaches into his hair and pulls out a baseball bat, holding it tightly as he scans his surroundings. There must be a robonoid around here somewhere; Padparadscha’s visions never lie.
He runs and then skids to a stop when he hears a noise. Lars turns his head, and red light flickers in the corner of his vision. A memory flashes through his mind, one of protecting the Gems from the robonoids as they tried to shatter them, before climbing onto one and hitting it and it exploding and…
Yeah, that’s totally a robonoid.
So Lars spins around and brandishes the bat, and the robonoid comes into his vision. And before it even has a chance to scan him, he smashes it with the bat. It crashes into the tunnel wall and explodes, spraying Lars with debris.
He steps backwards, shoving the bat back into his hair. And Lars is stood there, brushing bits of metal and rock from his shirt when Rhodonite and the Rutile twins rush towards him and pull him into a tight hug.
“Thank you, Lars!” Rhodonite cries, laughing hysterically as she clings to him.
“You did it,” Lefty says; Righty adds, “You destroyed it.”
Lars blushes, his cheeks going a darker shade of pink. “Yeah, I guess I did.”
“Congratulations, Lars,” Fluorite says when she catches up, a grinning Padparadscha clinging to her.
“But it was Pads who told us about the robonoid,” he says. Lars ruffles Padparadscha’s hair, and she smiles and holds his wrist.
“Yeah, good going, Padparadscha,” Rhodonite says, and she hugs her.
Soon, everyone is hugging Padparadscha, the smallest Gem surrounded by the rest of the Off Colors.
“You know, I guess your visions can come in handy, Pads,” Lars says.
Fluorite frowns. “How… do you mean?”
“Because it doesn’t matter if something’s happened in the past if none of us noticed it happen,” he says.
Padparadscha grins and hugs Lars, jumping up to wrap her arms around his neck. “Thank you, Human Lars.”
Lars smiles too. “No problem. Now, I don’t know about you guys, but I think we should turn back. After all, this is gonna lead to a dead end.”
“Good idea,” Fluorite says.
“I thought you would never suggest it,” a relieved Rhodonite says, and they head back to their current base camp.
And as they walk, Lars looks at them all. And he knows that it totally sucks to be stuck out in space like this, but at least he’s got the Off Colors.