Pushed Too Far (Evil Steven AU)

Shrinking Ground

Lapis' P.O.V

I groan and stretch my arms as I wake up from another night of restlessness. Even though recently I've not been having good nights of sleeping, seeing Steven and talking/hugging him gave my mind too much to think about to ensure a decent amount of rest last night. I'm still kind of sad, though, that he didn't come with me, because that's what I really wanted to happen. But, I'm not quitting until Steven comes back to me. Sitting up in my hammock, I go to slip out of it and I technically do, just not in the fashion I was wanting. I end up clumsily tumbling out of my hammock and landing roughly on the floor, giving me a nice good wake up call. This also alerted Peridot, who was already at our planning workbench for the day, that I was awake.

"Good morning, Lazuli" My small green friend says, turning to me with her tablet in hand as I pick myself up off the floor.

"You're up and about rather early today" I comment, walking over to where she's standing, "Did something happen while I was asleep?"

"Not quite" Peridot admits, "But there is something I wanted to inform you of".

"Ok, then, spill," I say, leaning against the workbench.

"Well, while you went to the Temple to see how Amethyst was holding up, I went to that meeting with the parents and kids that you didn't want to attend and found her there" Peridot arches her eyebrows, folding her arms, "But, that's not all. Mr. Maheswaran was practically forced to leave due to the parents having lost their patience with him. Kids getting killed can do that to you. And I went on to explain what we found out, especially in regards to Alesha".

"Right, right" I nod, remembering looking over that file and the photo within it.

"Here's the best part, though. When I was about to show her picture to everyone that was there, Mr. Maheswaran's phone, that he evidently forgot he left at the Big Donut, began ringing. Guess who it was?" Peridot hints.

"Steven?" I speculate.

"Steven" Peridot confirms, "He said that he just saw you, among other things. Is this true?"

"Yeah, yeah, it's true" I tell her, gently rubbing my arm and remembering that hug we shared out in the rain.

I wish we could've had more time to continue it.

"He must've said something to you, right? What was it?" Peridot leans forward, obviously curious.

"He said that he was done killing, that he came there to bury something that he didn't want me digging back up, Connie was the last person he killed, and that he was shocked to hear that Jenny and Peedee were dead. He also admitted that he wasn't the one who killed them, the reason being because he didn't have any issues with them" I recall to the best of my ability.

"Huh, interesting" Peridot thinks out loud, "Either he's good at keeping up a story or is actually telling the truth about not killing Jenny and Peedee, because he said pretty much the exact same things on the phone".

"Did you bring up Alesha when you talked to him, because I forgot her name when I was talking to him about the possibility of a second killer, mainly because, I suppose, I'm the first one to hear him admit to him not committing those murders?" I ask her.

"It was Amethyst who brought it up, along with her demanding him to tell everyone where Alice Anderson was. I didn't have the heart to tell her that going by the picture of Alesha, Alesha was Alice and given the fact that she lied about her real name, she must be hiding other things too, like why she came to the Temple, because I refuse to believe that she just stumbled across it" Peridot articulates, keeping her arms folded, "But, I'm getting sidetracked here. The phone went dead before we could get an answer on the Alesha/Alice question. Things went quiet inside the Big Donut and then Amethyst asked me to show the picture of Alesha like I was originally going to. I went to pull it up on my tablet when a medium-sized rock hit the glass door behind us and cracked the material, it being quite a surprise to all of us. Many of us moved back, but Amethyst and Greg saw something out in the rain. A pink jacket and who out of everyone in Beach City wears one? Steven. And despite the parent's protests on going outside the restaurant, Greg ran out into the rain with Amethyst going after him, the both of them chasing Steven into town".