Chapter Text
“Log Date… Well to be honest I’ve lost count. But the truth is this will be my last recording.”
Peridot stood in the same field she’d crashed in just last year. The field that had greeted her when she came to Earth would now be saying goodbye to her too. She looked up as a bright light shone down on her.
“As you all remember the other day I went “missing”. Well when I left it was to the battle field where I had tried to yes kill you four. You see I found that from there I could reroute some of the wiring and while I could not send out any signals I could receive them. Well I received a signal straight from Homeworld. They said they would be sending an infiltrator to find the traitors on Earth.”
It was a diamond shaped ship bright and yellow with a cloaking system that hid it. She knew the ship perfectly it was one that she had worked on back when she was first made. It was an infiltrator ship straight from homeworld coming to land. It was a small ship that wouldn’t hold many gems but would drop a few soldiers before it left again.
“Now I know what you must be thinking. You’re thinking I’m planning to turn you clods in and go home a hero. Well I could do that. Except I wouldn’t be going home a hero because I wouldn’t be going home at all. Humans have such an interesting description of home. Dictionary definition calls it The place where one lives permanently, especially as a member of a family or household. But I have found that is not exactly right. Home is where you feel safe and like you are welcome, loved unconditionally. If that is the case then Homeworld is no longer my home. I have found my home here with the fiv- I’m sorry. Four of you.”
Peridot rolled the detonator in her small hand looking down to it a moment. She knew exactly where they were going to land and she had it ready for them. Now she just had to wait for them to land and step off the ship. She had it set up to reach the entrance of the ship and any spots she could remember that would be unprotected from the blast.
“While you are all annoying, confusing and defective I too am defective. You all showed me that was not exactly a bad thing though. I am more then just a Peridot now because of you four. Now I can hold my head high and say I am not a Peridot. I am Peridot. Perhaps that doesn’t make much sense but nothing on this planet makes sense. Certainly not I.”
The ship landed before her and the entrance opened in front of her. Two quartz soldiers that she did not recognize stepped off the ship walking straight for her. She held the activator behind her back rolling it over in her hand careful not to press the button just yet. “Who is this?” one of the two gems asked.
“It appears to be the traitor Peridot. But I don’t see the others.” The other replied. Peridot held her head high looking up at the two soldiers and no longer afraid of them.
“This is the last I will ever be able to speak to any of you. So as my final goodbye I would like to say thank you. Thank you to Steven for showing me that I did not need my enhancers to be the person I wanted to be. Steven you are an oddity, an abnormality and honestly? An abomination. But you are still much more than that. You are kind even to those who do not deserve it. You are brave and a protector and strong. Steven I don’t say this often. In fact I have never said this before. But I am proud to have been able to call myself your friend.”
Peridot pressed the detonator and dropped it into the tall grass behind her. The countdown was to begin now. While the two Quartz insisted on walking her back to the ship and straight to the holding cells. There was no escape now and she did not plan to escape because that would ruin her entire plan.
“Pearl. When I first met you I believed you were just like me. That you were exactly what your name dictated what you were suppose to be. Like me I believed you were nothing more then what everyone on Homeworld believed you to be. That you were just a Pearl, a show thing, something completely and utterly useless. But you proved me wrong. While I may not want to admit it, I respect you. Because you are something fascinating. For a Pearl you are strong and brave and a wonderful technician. You have built some amazing things out of what I could not. You have built entire ships and what Steven likes to call “Robots” out of completely nothing. Pearl I am glad to have met you too because you are what I strived to be.”
Peridot stood in the cell staring out at the quartz before her. They were talking amongst themselves “How’d a simple Peridot get this far out?”
“How should I know? Probably luck.” The other replied before the both turned. Peridot sat down on the side of the wall sighing and removing her mask leaving her gem and eyes exposed.
“Permafusion better known as Garnet. I wish I had been around long enough to have meet the gems that made you up. Because while I was not always terribly welcoming to you and while lots of times I felt uncertain around you. It is now that I wish to admit that you are not two gems like I believed you to be. You are one gem, an entity all your own. You’ve taught me fusion is not just a tactic for fighting. It is something special and if down with the right person, it can be something truly fantastically beautiful. I’m glad to have met you because you prove to me what fusion truly can be and if it weren’t for that… Well, I won’t be able to say what I’m about to say next.”
Peridot counted down in her head the steps of the two quartz leaving matching up with the internal ticking she was counting. The bombs would be going off soon leaving the infiltrator, the gems and her in nothing more the firey rubble. If her calculations were correct the bombs she left would be enough to break not only the ship but their gems and what did not break. Well hopefully the Crystal gems would find them.
“While living here I’ve learned a lot about something fascinating called love. When you have strong “feelings” for another living being and you want to spend the rest of your life with them. Well I will not be able to do that because my plan calls for drastic actions. But while I was here I did find someone who I believe I loved. Amethyst. I wish I could have admitted this in person but I believe I love you.”
She opened her eyes letting the yellow light and coloring filled her vision. This was the first time in months she’d taken her glasses off. The last time she’d removed them at the kindergarten with Amethyst… She closed her eyes again unable to let the last color she saw be this horrid yellow that she used to love so much.
“Amethyst how to describe you? You’re messy, you act without thinking, you’re irresponsible and childish. Yet I do believe…. No. I know that somewhere along the way of everything that happened I fell in love with you. I think it might have been when we first fused. Even when we weren’t fused I felt big and important and like you cared for me. Then when we did fuse. It was beautiful and wonderful and I wanted it to last forever. But I’m not like Garnet I couldn’t have kept it up. Which is why I ended the fusion as soon as it was no longer necessary. But if we could go back to that time I would be, as Steven puts it, overjoyed. I do not know if you return these feelings or not but if you do… Well I’m sorry.”
Tears began to slip out as memories of her time with the crystal gems came flooding back to her memory. She couldn’t stand this, she didn’t want to cry. She didn’t want to leave this planet with tears. But the click underneath her and the explosion that followed told her that’s exactly how it was meant to end.
“So as my good bye to each and every one of you. I want to say thank you crystal clods. I am glad to have met you and worked with you. I hope I have redeemed myself in your eyes. Thank you again and goodbye.”
A click ended the recording leaving Steven and the gems staring at the recorder and instantly understanding what had just happened. Garnet was leaning against the wall refusing to look at the recorder, Amethyst stood from her seat and ran to her room refusing eye contact with anyone and Pearl sat with her hands folded and head down. Steven too shocked to move or even react fully yet just sat on the couch staring at the recorder. The message was from last night and the news report of the fire in the field that morning told them it was too late for anything to be fixed now.