Diamond Loyalty (Stevidot)

Loyalties Lie

Steven's P.O.V

I had to play my cards just right in order to walk out of that room without the suit getting damaged. Well, 'walked' is putting it generously since I was once again put in a restraining hold by Jasper's Amethyst Guards and escorted out of the room when Jasper was done with me. Her words still ring in my ears, though, and some of what she said really stuck with me more than I thought it would. I wish I could help her, but with how she acts, she wouldn't be accepting of any help I'd offer. In fact, she'd probably scoff at the thought of me even suggesting such a thing. Still, I felt like it could've gone worse. But now I need to ensure that Peri's doing ok. I hate seeing her cry and if any of these gems made her cry, they're going to see a new side of Steven Universe that the universe hasn't fully known yet.

My travel between corridors is short and forced, the Amethysts nearly dragging me into this room lined with cells that looked just like the ones on Yellow Diamond's armship all those years ago. I'm then pushed/thrown/shoved inside one on the right, the energy forcefield deactivating and then reactivating once I'm inside, the Amethysts walking away bantering to each other. Grunting, I pick myself up off the ground, standing up and getting my bearings. The entire cell is just a small cubed-shaped space cut into the orange rock making up the moon's surface, the energy field being the only thing that stands out from everything else. And just as I'm thinking to myself "Where is Peridot?", I hear a tapping on rock and some whispering. I go to the wall on my right and listen, seeing as I can't press my ear against the surface since I'm, again, still in this suit. The noise is definitely coming from the cell over and the whispering faintly says to 'look down here', so I crouch down and scan the wall. I almost miss seeing a small hole, but my powers of observation, just like my gem powers, haven't failed me yet. Peering through, I just barely make out some green and black, that is until the whispering gets more audible.

"Steven?" Peridot's voice whispers.

"Yes, it's me, Peridot,"  I whisper back.

"Oh, thank the stars" Peridot sighs in relief, "I was more worried than you could've imagined".

"I really don't want to imagine that, thank you"  I reply, my eyes temporarily flitting to the ground before going back to looking through the hole, "Are you ok?".

"I'm fine" She answers, "Though what about you? You were gone for nearly 4 hours!".

"Shh! Let's keep our voices down"  I advise, not wanting her more raised tone to get any higher, "Anyone could be listening and we're surrounded by gems that won't hesitate to report to Jasper if they catch wind of something suspicious coming from us".

"Right, right" Peridot agrees, lowering her voice, "But, what did she say to you?".

"I'll tell you that in a minute, but first, we need to discuss a plan. A plan for a rescue mission because, let's face it, escaping is going to be next to impossible given what we've seen in those corridors outside"  I say, going on to tell my girlfriend the exact specifics, "As you might remember, I told S4INT to go back to Earth if we're not back in five hours. That time-frame has nearly reached its end, but I'm not going to wait for it to run out. Instead, I was wondering if you would send her a direct message to tell her that we've been captured and that she needs to go get the Crystal Gems".

"I'm more than willing to try, but how do I do that?" Peridot asks.

"The panel on the left arm of my suit relays information back to the ship, acting as a sort of storage drive of sorts while also being a smaller computer in and of itself. The signal, however, only works at a certain range, meaning that I can't be too far away or too high or far down, otherwise the signal won't transmit back to the ship. And due to the fact that we have multiple layers of rock over our heads, my guess is that the signal strength isn't strong enough for me to send the message myself. That's where you come in. You're better with technology than I am, so I need you to use your tablet, hack into the panel on my arm, boost the signal strength, and transmit the message to S4INT. Sounds easy enough. Do you think you can do that for me?"  I explain, sitting down with my back against the wall.