Abandoned Crystal System Colony Planet Earth - Friday, Fandom Time

[angry_pie_slice]

It had all started with the Crystal Gems taking a break. A break! In building the drill! To save the planet! The work was so tantalizingly close to being done that Peridot had complained to Steven, vehemently. It had involved waving a little power drill in the air for emphasis. Which had, as most things around here seemed to do, inspired Steven to

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[angry_pie_slice]

[angry_pie_slice]

Apparently it wasn't a time for trying to knee people in a tightly enclosed space, either. The forming Cluster down below rocked the planet again, and then a wave of white-light arms came crashing up towards them at just that very moment, rocking the drill violently.

Peridot lost her balance. Peridot got that incoming knee to the face, leaving her swinging back the other direction again, arms in the air and tiny legs akimbo as the wave receded again.

[studyingfear]

Honestly, turning Peridot into a comedy of pain really wasn't going to stop his laughter, except for the way the ship was rocked and tossed about and no one was at the controls.

This time it was Rufus dropping his PHS as he lunged for the controls.

He had no formal training, especially not in this ship, but he was a Shinra and, more importantly, he was Rufus.

He'd seen Peridot control it. That was enough for him to manage to stabilize the thing as well as it could be given… everything going on outside.

Once he got it under control, he absently scooped up his PHS.

"Honestly," he said snarkily to Jalian, "this is no time for ridiculous antics."

Because laughter had been the reasonable response. Of course.

"Does anyone have any idea about what to do with all of... that? Peridot, will the guns work on them?"

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At present, one foot was about all that could be seen of Peridot.

"We're in a drill," came a muffled reply from... somewhere on the floor. One little green hand reached up to point at the ceiling. "We drill."

She was not going to end up pointing right-side-up any time soon, unless someone was kind enough to pick her up by a foot or something.

[studyingfear]

Rufus was definitely not kind enough to do that. Sorry, Peridot.

"Alright," Rufus said, studying the controls. "If that's what you want, then hold on tight."

[kenselvren]

Jalian glared back at Rufus and offered Peridot a...well, a foot up, something to grab onto so she could right herself.

"They're screaming," she said. "All the pieces."

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Peridot grimaced as she kind of hauled herself up, arm-over-arm, using Jalian's leg as leverage.

"... Of course they are," she said, frowning. "They're all fragmented pieces of broken minds, forced into one form. They're also about to destroy the planet."

She frowned as she surfaced from under the dashboard and peered out at the Cluster, which didn't seem to be taking any substantial sort of damage from the drill.

"Try the triple-tip penetration setting!"

... Peridot wasn't allowed to name things.

[studyingfear]

"As you wish, Captain," he said lightly, tweaking the controls until the triple-tip penetration setting started up.

The smoothness of Rufus' voice betrayed the fact that, yeah, he was totally still having a damn good time.

This was terrifying, exhilarating, and he felt alive.

[angry_pie_slice]

The drill shifted, then, until one drilling end piece was joined by two more, which doubled-down on the massive crystalline structure below them. Peridot would have been pleased herself, either by being called 'Captain' or by the creation that she and Pearl had built being put to such good used, if not for one fact.

They still weren't making much progress.

Meanwhile, the millions of fractured minds below continued to scream in silence, their voices rising up in a cacophonous mental roar.

Must... Have to... Want to... Need to... Have to...

[kenselvren]

"Can you hear them?" Jalian asked Peridot, wincing at all the minds.

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"Hear them... what? Are they still screaming?" Peridot looked at Jalian, something between curiosity and confusion on her face.

Apparently, no, she couldn't hear anything at all.

The Cluster continued to chant though, as shapes struggled to take form below them.

Want to... Need to... Want to... want to... need to...

[studyingfear]

"The only thing I hear is the two of you nattering," Rufus said 'helpfully'.

He was more interested in a) controlling the drill and b) doing his best to film what was going on around them.

Priorities!

[kenselvren]

"They want. They need," Jalian said. "I don't know what."

[angry_pie_slice]

As if in reply, all of the voices rose up at once, in a blinding cacophony of noise, all with one thing in mind.

Form!

It was a desperate compulsion to be whole, five millennia in the making.

[kenselvren]

"To be whole, to have a form!" Jalian winced. "They are very loud."

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"Well, tell them they can't have it," Peridot demanded, trying to scoot in beside Rufus to help man the controls. One of the three drill ends buckled and snapped off, leaving them to try to balance on two spinning points. "If they form, they'll take us and the entire planet with them!"