#....in the span of about. mmmm. three hours? ish?

[mayasaura]

Actually. Looking at the chronology. The last time Gideon and Harrow talked alone before the pool scene, Gideon accused Harrow of being a jealous creep for telling her to stay away from Dulcinea.

A whole lot of stupifying things happened in between, but really, it wouldn't be surprising if her first panicked reaction to Harrow disrobing was to think Harrow was making a move on her. Relationship definitely hurtling toward something.

[hideyseek]

6. 10, 11? For ur ao3 wrapped? Mehabs?

(im on mobile if something is weird. No it isnt)

bro ,,,,, im so sorry to report something was weird, i only saw this guy come in today he was not in my inbox before. apology for delay. but hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii yes thank you for the ask!!!!! of course i will answer i love to fucking TALK hehe :3

ao3 wrapped asks

6. Favorite title you used?

mmmm hehe. i'm gonna answer this based purely on title vibes as opposed to like "how well the title fits the fic" bc i wrote a bunch of shorter (to me) fics without a lot of internal thematic happenings that a title could reflect and so i don't really think of anything i published that a title is doing very much work.

i think my favorite title of anything published this year is i wish you the wind just because ah ... what a phrase! no idea what this means but it sounds so damn romantic to me! really has a flavor of like ... bittersweet farewell!

10. What work was the quickest to write?

mmm, haha. well, two answers to this i suppose. on one hand, there was keep me here which unfortunately i wrote in about one day from nothing (and therefore had approximately 12 minutes to revise) because i was determined to post SOMETHING for that day of kaze week 2023. but the first fic that came to mind (and perhaps the most accurate answer, time-wise) was my drabble from week 2 of inception wicked which came together in about three hours total drafting, but there was a span of several days (and truthfully several days that felt like several weeks lol) between me initially having the idea and sitting down to draft. but like, to be fair, it is about 400 words so revising goes exponentially quicker. truly this shocked even me, though i guess really what this means is i already was primed with a bunch of subconscious thoughts about the dynamic in this fic lol. (you can read it here on the gdoc with the other fics from that week! bc i haven't gotten around to posting on ao3 yet lol. content warnings for: semi-explicit sexual content, fantasizing about a married couple, voyeurism)

11. What work took you the longest to write?

hmm ... i don't know if there's a winner for anything i published, tbh. most of the rest of the kaze week fics from january kind of came together in a span of 3-5 days depending on the fic, and most of the other drabbles for both events came together in about the alotted week. so instead i'm going to gleefully misinterpret this question so i can talk about my beloved unpublished nemesis project, narrative!fic :3

i hate that guy! (<- said extremely lovingly) i probably earnestly worked on this fic for ... 4 or 5 months of this year? had a nice breakthrough for some story logic in august / september ish, outlined from that through october, and wrote pretty diligently for most of november. (i did tell my roommate fully two years ago, "hey you need to watch kazetsuyo so i can make you betaread this fic i'm writing at the end of the year, i'll watch star trek with you in exchange". that was literally 2021 lmao. they have not yet seen a draft bc there has not been a draft worth having anybody else look at yet.)

i think the thing that has made the process of drafting narrative!fic so long is really just that, for the last two-ish years, narrative!fic wasn't actually a story to me, so much as it was a project into which i dumped all my post-college facing-the-future feelings and loosely tied up with a string called "i'm sure i can make haiji go through this as well". but then, due to various life events in april of this year, suddenly i came back to the draft and it was like: oh. ohhh, okay. i can see how this can be a story, actually. this is about haiji, as a character, as opposed to haiji, as a semi-direct proxy for myself. and then over the next few months i cut out a ton of stuff and reworked his main arc and now it's like ... a story, instead of just a bunch of feelings and events. which, truly, is only my personal marker for what i was looking for from the project. like, i personally want a separation of my own experiences from what is in my fic, i want to be thinking about developments in the fic as narrative choices the story requires rather than as alternatives to how my own life could have gone. (which ultimately may well be the same thing but its the headspace im in, for me).

and i think the other part is just -- i didn't know how to write! i mean, obviously i know how to string words into a sentence lol. but a LOT of i guess the first two years of drafting and then setting all the drafted stuff aside to start again from scratch like four times over, was me learning to like, figure out my own longfic writing process. (big sobbing emoji, lmao. i remember in my youth reading about maggie stiefvater having 200k of unused draft material for one of the trc books and i was like, how??? and now i am like: yeah. unfortunately i get it. not that my tossed-out drafter material is of that specific magnitude. but there is a lot of it, goddamn.) and now that i've got at least an initial / foundational sense of it, the hardest part is only actually sitting down and writing. (i say as if this is not also, extremely challenging for me lol). so uh, i guess i'll say here "maybe this time next year i'll really have a full draft of narrative!fic", and. we'll see how that goes :3

[ashketchup119]

Musicality

Ok I LOVE this story!! I made a whole story based off a lil convo @jemtoka and I had, and I made oc’s based off each of us and went to town. It was very fun to write, and I got to combine my music knowledge with my writing skills.

Enjoy!

When Benji had first set out to find the ghost of Beethoven, he wasn’t actually sure that he’d be able to do it. His brother had once called him “all bite and no bark”, a reference to the fact that out of the four brothers, Benji had been the only one to not outgrow his infant habit of biting things- or people- when stressed. But in this situation, he definitely felt like he’d bitten off more than he could chew.

He absentmindedly chewed on his chewing necklace as he drafted a grant proposal with his friend, Mujika. Muji was drawing in a notebook, something for his art classes, though he looked up when prompted to review the words that had appeared on Benji’s screen. Muji had done his fair share of research, and though he did want to help with the writing of the research paper, it had been agreed that Benji was the more… academic writer. The two of them had met through social media a couple of years ago, and once they’d started direct messaging, had become close friends quickly through a mesh of shared interests, similar humor, and a half-baked scheme to take over the world.

Which led them here, to a table in the back of a 24-hour McDonalds, Benji chewing the head off a stiff chewable bat pendant and Muji using his nocturnal tendencies to do things like “make sure his friend drank water and didn’t forget that he was a person.”

“Fo you fink ish bit avou duh Immoruhl Bewuved ith done? Ish kinda duh hoh vashis of arr puhposal so…” Benji trailed off, jaw absentmindedly moving over the poor bat, whose head was holding on by sheer force of will to the rest of its body.

“What?” Muji asked. He did not speak bat-in-mouth.

Benji pulled the pendant out of his mouth with an audible pop. “Y’think this bit about the Immortal Beloved is finished? It’s like, the whole basis of our proposal n shit.”

He turned the laptop towards Muji, who closed his notebook, set it to the side, and pulled the laptop in front of him. He read it quietly, and Benji began to tap out the beat to the song playing on low volume in his earbuds. He began to hum, too, murmuring lyrics under his breath as he stared off into the distance.

“I think it looks good.” Muji finally replied, turning the laptop back toward Benji and grabbing his notebook again. “I can’t think of anything else we could add to that section.”

Benji gave a little half shrug. “I guess you’re right.”

The two of them once again worked in solitude, only broken by Benji ordering fries at about 1 AM. At 3, they decided to call it quits, though Benji seemed more wired than ever and voiced some apprehension about “going to sleep when there’s so much work to be done, Muji!” Muji chastised him slightly and promised that they could come back the next day- or rather, later that day- to finish up. There were only slight revisions to be done, then it could be sent off to the Music Master Scholars, an organization dedicated to the care and keeping of the ghosts widely considered Music Masters, which included household names like Mozart and Beethoven, but also lesser-known composers like Joseph Bologne and Francesca Caccini.

Ghosts were, of course, a commonplace occurrence, though one could theoretically live their life without interacting with one. That was rare, though; ghosts had a tendency to wander, though they could only appear in places that held significance to them in life and graveyards, but even living in a house increased the average person’s chances of encountering a ghost exponentially.

But these ghosts were special, because of the knowledge they possessed and the lives they’d lead. The Music Master Scholars were the only people in the world who both knew and had access to the location of every ghost, and to join their ranks, one had to find the location of one of the ‘hidden’ Music Masters- of which Beethoven was the most hidden. Their non-administrative members were unknown, but said to be most, if not all, of the foremost music scholars in the world. How could they not be, with the Masters themselves guiding their research?

Benji and Muji really, really wanted to be Music Master Scholars.

When he was 10, Benji had been given some sort of “young musician” scholarship to visit Europe for a month. He was a double bassist, a dying breed in the modern age, and the fact that he had progressed from monotonic exercises to Baroque sinfonias in the span of four months had impressed his teachers.

His parents had gone along, too, mostly because they knew their child, and Benji did have a propensity to get into trouble. Devil’s luck, his mother had tsked, and that had been that.

He’d managed to escape the group in the middle of a museum, though he didn’t wander far. He just wanted to look at everything without feeling like people were constantly breathing down his neck.

Well. HE didn’t consider “the park near the museum” to be far. His parents did, though, he found out later.

At the park, he found a man. Well, not a man. A ghost. The ghost was staring wistfully at the museum in the distance, and started when he noticed a small child staring at him.

“Hi! Who are you?” Benji asked, clutching the stuffed animal his parents had gotten him at another museum the day before.

The ghost cleared his throat. “I’m uh…” He started in a raspy voice before pausing and clearing his throat again. “I’m,” He sighed. “I’m Johannes Brahms.”

“Yo-hahn Brahmzzzz.” Benji repeated, drawing out the last “s” sound. “Oh! You did music, right?”

Brahms smiled slightly, and nodded.

The two of them talked for a while before Benji’s parents arrived, harried and frustrated. They apologized profusely to the ghost, who insisted it hadn’t been a problem.

The whole experience left Benji starry-eyed, and with the help of a friend he’d made in Germany, he would call and converse with Brahms for hours, asking about counterpoint and meaning and technique and just in general picking his mind. The composer took this with grace, and seemed more than happy to answer the young musician’s questions. When he’d told Benji about the Scholars, Benji had immediately decided that he was going to be a Music Master Scholar.

Muji had played violin until he’d dropped out of high school to take care of his mom, and hadn’t resumed it until after him and Benji had been talking for a while. He didn’t know much about composition, but he loved music history, and after getting his GED and enrolling in college, had even majored in it. Plus, he just kinda just thought the whole thing was cool.

They’d been researching for a year and a half, with pointers from Brahms, and tips from a professor Benji’d had two years ago, a Classical scholar named Dr. Chang. Benji had once emailed her and asked, point-blank, if she was a Music Master Scholar, but she’d only sent back a cryptic winky face emoji in response.

The next day, after three more hours of sitting in McDonalds, revising the proposal (most of which was Muji saying “Benji it looks fine!” and Benji responding with “No, no, this comma in paragraph seven just makes it sound better! Ties it all together, don’t you think?”), it was sent off in an email, and Benji resolved not to think about it while Muji resolved to mention it at the most inopportune moments, just to mess with his friend a little.

They were approved a month later, and three months after that day at McDonalds, they were sitting on a plane heading to Austria, Benji mouthing practice phrases in German as Muji slept. They had about a month to traipse all over Europe in search of a ghost very few people had been able to find, and they were excited to start.

The first week was spent in Austria, visiting Beethoven’s own grave (a nonstarter; the ghosts there hadn’t seen Beethoven since he was buried, and none knew where he’d gone), his childhood home and the area surrounding.

Nothing.

The second week was spent in Vienna. There, they visited the ghost of Mozart, who was a fidgety, flighty sort. He was known for being somewhat immaterial, and often took to jumping on top of objects in a manner that caused the people around them to panic for a few seconds before realizing he was too immaterial to do anything more than whisper vaguely about his childhood. He’d tried to pet Muji’s hair and got annoyed when nothing happened, so it wasn’t a particularly long visit.

They tried to visit Haydn, but while the location of Haydn’s ghost was well-known, only Music Master Scholars were allowed to see him, as he claimed the crowds exhausted him, and he wanted to be able to give his full attention to those visiting him. It made sense, since ghosts used massive amounts of energy to communicate and interact with the world around them, and the more energy they expended, the less time they were able to spend on earth. Despite this, the two  of them did make an effort, but were summarily barred from entering.

“Next time!” Benji declared confidently as they walked to their next potential Beethoven hot spot.

They visited Brahms, who had resolved to meet them in Vienna upon learning they were coming, and spent a whole day with him, visiting locations which had been important to him and letting his impromptu history lessons wash over them with a look of awed reverence.

Beethoven wasn’t in Vienna, and by the third week the two friends were feeling the threat of rejection hot on their heels. They began keeping odd hours, trying their hardest to figure out their next move.

“Maybe we should reread our proposal? Clearly the Scholars saw something in it, right?” Muji theorized from the bed he’d claimed as his their first night in the hotel.

“Mmmm.” Benji responded from his position on the floor at the foot of his bed, still feeling the after-effects of a well-deserved mental breakdown.

“Come on, Benji!” Muji tried to motivate him. “We can do it! You’re a super cool music spy, remember?”

Benji huffed at the reminder of an old, inane conversation between the two. “I don’t know, Muji. I think it’s kinda pointless.”

“Come on, Benji!” Muji tried again. “This is like, your dream! It’s now or never! Put our mutual brain cell to use so we can find Beethoven!”

Benji sighed and got up. “Fine, fine.” He murmured as he got off the floor, grabbed his copy of the proposal from his bag, laid down on the bed, and stuffed another chewable pendant into his mouth. “Wet’s fee.”

Silence reigned for a few, brief seconds, before Muji suddenly exclaimed, “Hey! We never checked out anything about the Immortal Beloved, right?”

Benji sat up straight on his bed and spit out the pendant. “Holy shit, we never checked out anything about the Immortal Beloved.”

After a quick Google search, two train tickets, a couple of sandwiches, and a dash through the rain, they arrived at the Frankfurt Main Cemetery. There, they asked after the name they’d listed in their proposal as the possible Immortal Beloved, and the ghosts pointed them towards the back of the cemetery.

In a ghost grotto, they found a woman, calmly humming the tune from one of the Diabelli variations, though in their excitement neither Benji nor Muji could name the tune.

“Are you-“ Benji paused and took a couple of deep breaths. “Are you the Immortal Beloved?

The woman stopped humming and smiled at them.

“Ah, that is a moniker I have not heard in some time.” She arose and walked away from them, lifting her skirts elegantly in a manner which conveyed a sense of class. “Come; I think you are the ones I’ve been expecting.”

The two followed after her eagerly and looked confused when they stopped at a mail office in town. There, she reached into a P.O. box, pulled out a silver envelope, and gave it to Benji.

“This is yours.” She murmured. “Please do come to visit; it’s rare that I receive visitors.”

With this, she disappeared.

The two stared at the envelope for a couple of seconds before Benji eagerly opened it, accidentally ripping the envelope in half. He then read it, brow furrowing in confusion.

“What’s it say?” Asked Muji, eagerly, from over his shoulder.

“It says… it’s just numbers? I don’t get it.” Benji gave him the paper, trying to puzzle out what it meant.

Muji frowned, then plugged the numbers into Google.

“It’s a location!” He burst out, excitedly shoving the phone in Benji’s face.

The two of them hurriedly called a taxi, listing the location Muji’s phone had given them. They were dropped off in front of the building, and saw someone standing at the entrance. They showed the person (a Scholar!) their letter, and with a large smile, they were taken inside, their guide walking confidently as Benji and Muji trailed behind them. The interior of the building was long and winding, which left the two feeling as though they’d been deceived by the outward appearance of the building. The building had looked small and unassuming, and this place was built like a maze. They were sure they’d be lost if they tried to head back without a guide.

Near the end of the path they heard the sound of a piano playing, and warm light spilled into the hallway. They eagerly rushed ahead, much to the amusement of the Scholar.

There, facing the wall, conducting half a beat behind the sound coming from the recorder behind him, stood Beethoven.

Benji gasped, and clutched Muji’s shoulder. He pointed ecstatically at the figure in the room. “It’s Beethoven!!!” He stage-whispered.

Muji smiled widely as he nodded back. “Yeah!!”

The two of them turned around when a voice behind them cleared. The Scholar gave them each a thick letter with the recognized seal of the Music Master Scholars on the back, and the two of them stared at it, unsure of what to do.

“Well?” The Scholar prompted, rocking back and forth on their heels. “Aren’t you going to open it?”

Benji ripped into his envelope first, completely abandoning the flap as he tore the side off. His hands shook as he pulled out a letter on creamy white stationary. He skimmed the words and began crying, clutching the letter and envelope to his chest.

Muji was slightly more careful, removing the letter from the envelope via the flap and pulling out the other contents of the envelope. A laminated membership card, a list of locations of other ghosts, and an alphabetized list of other Scholars with contact info and a small bio were also in the envelope. He pulled out each one, looked at it, and put it back in the envelope. He then stopped and held the envelope in his hands, staring at it.

After about ten minutes, the guide worriedly asked Muji, “Is Benji alright? He’s been crying for a while.”

Muji nodded absentmindedly. “Yeah, he cried for like two hours after I finished streaming Crisis Core for him.” At the guide’s look of confusion, he added, “Video game.”

The guide made a small noise of understanding and nodded.

When Benji’s sobs finally faded into sniffles, the three of them began the trek out of the building.

“Sorry this route is so long.” The Scholar apologized. “Oh! Also! I forgot to introduce myself.” They paused and turned, offering their hand. “I’m Soraya Cham! I was the last person to find Beethoven’s ghost. When I heard about you guys, I got excited, really. I was rooting for you!”

The two of them shook her hand and nodded, unsure what else to say.

Soraya continued, then hailed a taxi when they reached the road. They waved goodbye to Benji and Muji as the two of them got in the backseat.

“We did it!” Benji shouted once they were back at their hotel.

[nexstage]

LIMBO SILVAM - PART 7

If there was something Peridot hated of the frozen forest, apart of being stranded there without a single clue of why and how, that was not finding anything remotely different in the scenery. Everything was black, white and grey like those old human movies that lacked any color. Only threes, the gray-ish sky and no sign of life around her and Lapis.

Yep, depressing.

At least she had Lapis at her side. Though, she was really worried about her condition. It had already passed half an hour -if her calculations were right- and the blue gem hadn't woken up yet. Having to carry her body on her back while watching and listening with the best of attention for any threats was really exhausting. At least, she was lucky it was Lapis the one she had to carry because if it were Garnet or Bismuth, that would have been impossible.

Peridot glanced at her companion with anxious eyes. Part of the blue gem's face was tainted with those gray splotches along with other parts of her body, and she seemed to have a troubled dream or something. Whatever she was dreaming seemed pretty painful; just looking at her whole condition reminded Peridot of Pumpkin's symptoms of putrefaction before she died.

The green gem shook her head. There was no time to dwell in past losses, besides, Lapis would be fine! They would find a way out of the forest and take a long, well-deserved vacation in their home, Little Homeworld. And stay very, VERY far away from anything forest-related.

"Mmmm... Mmmmhhmmm" Peridot glanced at Lapis again and saw her eyebrows getting together in an uncomfortable expression.

"Lapis, hey, wake up" the former technician patted her friend's cheek to no avail. Then, suddenly, a gray splotch in the ocean gem's shoulder grew a bit larger much to Peridot's shock. Her steps became frantic while she looked everywhere for a place to rest and check on her friend, but the forest was so dense and silent that it would be suicide to take a break where those goddamn creatures could hunt them down.

"D-Don't worry, Laz. We'll get out of here. Just hold on" She said with strong resolution. Despite feeling her legs going stiff for moments and hurt terribly, that didn't stop Peridot to continue walking through the forest in hopes to find an exit or a safer place to rest.

Minutes passed, the green gem didn't know how many but what she was aware of was the irregular pain in some zones of her body. 'Stars... What now?' she thought tiredly and looked at the palm of her right hand.

Let's just say, the surprise she got wasn't pretty at all.

"W-What the--?!" a big gray spot was there, but that wasn’t the worst part. In the center of the spot, there was a black point that grew bigger while many veins-like lines expanded from it. Was she corrupted too?!

"Ok, ok. Calm down, Peridot. You're still sane, still thinking clearly and remembering who you are. This... This is nothing" a voice in her head told her otherwise which didn't help with her high anxiety.

She kept walking, kept looking for a refuge and taking short glances at Lapis -still unconscious- whose body's condition wasn't any better. "You know, L-Laz... I don't want to remind you this, though I doubt you can hear me, but this issue is reminding me of many bitter things"

Peridot wasn't that sure of why she was talking when it was clear only she could respond, but at least that calmed her nerves. The defeaning silence of the forest was so overwhelming that at any moment the former technician could imagine one of those things appearing in an instant to kill them both.

Her voice alongside carrying Lapis' body gave her something to hold on, for her sanity was slipping quickly as her fears drowned her rationality. "Y-You remember Pumpkin, right?" She scoffed a bit at herself for that question "Stupid. Of course, you do. W-Well, when you left to the moon, Pumpkin was very sad... Like me. And, you would have seen her face when you came back! Though you did, you know? Pumpkin was as happy as I. We were finally together. L-Like a family" some tears fell from her eyes, but Peridot ignored them "We've been so d-distraught when w-we knew that Pumpkin's life span was very short... That she'd be gone"

The green gem sniffed. Then she stopped after hearing something, her gaze directed to the source of the sound, but found nothing. Maybe her imagination. She shook her head and looked at Lapis who was still dealing with some kind of pain in her unconsciousness. Peridot continued talking, "We were a mess... I was trying so hard to find a way for her to live l-longer, a-and you were putting on a brave face for me. Y-You know, I considered it cute. Endearing. I even wanted to thank you for that but... But... We were so caught up in trying to make sense of what was happening that there was no chance to appreciate what the other was doing to improve the really stressful situation. I was so busy in making a long-life potion for Pumpkin, and you in helping me while being as strong as you could so I didn't fall apart that we just... I even remember the fight we had. Steven told us Pumpkin would die, I didn't want to believe it and you were pacing from one side to the other of our house, not knowing what to do... When you tried to comfort me, I exploded and ran away with Pumpkin. You then found me in a forest, crying, being pathetic... I thought you were being too optimistic for putting on a brave face for me, and you snapped at me for not seeing that you were just trying to help the same way I did for you in the past... We cried, we hugged each other, and... And we gave Pumpkin the last best moments of her life... She deserved it a-after all..."

Crack! Peridot froze and looked around her for any threat that could be hidden in the trees' shadows. Nothing. Her right foot, that was consumed in seething pain -though Peridot didn't notice because of her monologue- had broken a twig. She put it away with her foot and kept walking, Lapis' painful murmurs distracting the green gem some times.

"Why am I telling you this? You may ask w-why, right? Well, t-the point is that, I love you... You're the only family I have left. Sure, I also have Steven and the Crystal Gems, Bismuth and Connie, but being with you, knowing you, helping you to be better, spending time with you, even mourning Pumpkin's death together, all of that makes me see that you're the most important person in my life... I don't know what I would do without you. The mere thought of losing you is too painful and terrifying for me to face. And I know the sentiment is mutual. So, L-Lapis, don't leave... Wake up..." Peridot shook her head once again, her eyes were losing vision no matter how much she tried to get rid of the water in them.

One of her hands rubbed her eyes, feeling the tears that were clouding them. She sighed bitterly, here she was, powerless in a forest, her friend unconscious and Peridot only resorted to let her fears out and cry. This wasn't a solution at all and to top it all, she had been crying in the whole monologue.

"U-Uggghhh... Stupid headache" and now she had to deal with that too. Great, marvellous. As if she didn't have enough problems already on her plate. She really deserves a-- "Aaaaahhhhhh!!!!" the headache intensified tremendously. It was like having a drill trying to perfor her gemstone at high velocity.

Some gray spots appear in her body but she didn't notice them. This, whatever it was affecting her gemstone so ruthlessly, wasn't a migraine but a mix of punches and explosions all concentrated in the core of her being. It was that hellish that Peridot accidentally let her unconscious friend to fall in the snow and got to her knees. More tears were gathering at her eyes, which made it difficult for her to see her surroundings if a new threat came to kill them.

Then, the forest, the snow-covered ground, the sky and everything else disappeared, being replaced with utter destruction. There was a giant creature trying to hit something and breathing fire, though she couldn't recognize it. Her surrounding were too blurry, like her eyes were submerged in murky water.

The sounds didn't make sense either. It was a complete chaos. Yelling, words and fighting overlapped each other while attempting to take over the other ones.

Peridot's head swiveled around, trying to find a reason as to why she teleported (?) to another place. First the little gem was in the forest, carrying Lapis and now she found herself in some, some... Jungle engulfed in fire.

Some meters away from her, Peridot saw three people fighting each other, or two against one to be exact. They were impossible to recognize, goddamn time for her to be almost blind; one of them was inside a robot if Peridot got it right, the other one was flying. Both were facing person number three, whose agility made things pretty difficult for their adversaries.

"Hey, hey! Please, help me! I need to come back, my friend needs me!" she yelled but they didn't listen. "Hey, I know you guys have some important things to deal with! But Lapis is in danger! Please help me!" Again, nothing. She was wondering if her voice wasn't raised enough for them to stop or if they were too caught up in their feud to care.

Going there and cease the fight was suicide. Peridot's metal powers still didn't work nor she had resources to defend herself, and the situation was getting more confusing for her tastes, but she had to try. For Lapis.

The noises got worse and louder when she reached the battlefield, those three strangers still didn't notice her presence but that was alright. Once she put herself in the middle and shouted with all her might, they would stop and help her.

"STOP! STOP THIS INSTANT!" Peridot's voice resonated through the air, or so she desperately hoped. Then she kind of saw a pink-ish blur going right to her or to one of the people in the battle -she didn't know, but it was so fast that the green gem didn't have time to evade it. Then the hellish sensation of distorsion in her body. Like every particle was exploding, reforming and next exploding with double force than before.

And her gemstone... Oh stars, it felt like a roaring black hole trying to swallow her. Pain, powerful hits, twisting and chaotic noise overwhelmed her entire being to the point of madness.

'No... Nonononono! I can't give up! I can't right now! Please, someone stop this! Someone, please!' her tears filled her eyes and fell to the icy ground. A nerve-wracking headache expanded to all her body, Peridot even thought she heard a crack in her gem and cried. Her shriek bringing blackness to her mind as she fell unconscious.

-------------------

"When I woke up, I was almost covered in snow and there was some kind of shadow, very big by the way, that was looking at me. I jolted and tried to fight it but it vanished instantly. Then I got you out of the snow too and keep walking, and now we're here in this clearing and still lost. But, hey! You're alive, I'm alive, so no worries! Ow!" Peridot brought her hands to her gemstone and hissed painfully due to another stinging migraine.

Lapis was slack-jawed at how much her friend put herself in danger to save the blue gem even when her ferrokinesis couldn't work. "Peri, I-I'm sorry. I shouldn’t be such a burden to you"

Peridot looked at her in disbelief. "What the heck are you talking about, you clod?! You would've done the same for me! Besides... Besides... I didn't want to l--"

"You didn't want to lose me, I know. I may not be conscious back then, but I feel the same towards you"

"Uh, what?" the green gem raised an eyebrow, pretty confused. Lapis smirked a bit, "What? Don't play dumb, Peri. You just said it, remember? Besides..." she got serious in an instant "I'd rather die than losing you too. When Pumpkin... When she passed away, it was so difficult for me to smile again. It was a big blow for us. I tried to be strong like you because that's what you needed. Peridot, you're my family not only when we became friends, reconciled after I came back and now facing whatever this mess is. I love you too"

Peridot's cheeks darkened and she could feel the heat coming out of her ears like steam. 'Just now and we are dealing with a confession. And this isn't Camp Pining Hearts!' her head was a mealstrom of conflicting emotions, but when the little gem was going to say something, her left leg collapsed for the soreness created by those gray spots.

"Oh stars! Peridot, are you ok?!" Lapis hugged her before her friend reached the snow-covered ground, and kept her close to her chest. The former technician blushed profusely, her arms immediately wrapped around Lapis mid-section, and she looked at the ocean gem with a mix of hope and fear.

"L-Laz? Lapis? If, you know, for some reason we don't make it -which I don't want to imagine and neither you-, then I will tell you how I feel. At least, to go on without regrets... And I want you to do the same. Being honest with each other even if our somber circumstances demand something different from us. Ok?" Lapis nodded while gulping a bit.

"We were enemies before. You were my informant and prisoner, I was your captor. I hurt you, I showed you that I changed for the better thanks to Steven. It was a tough journey when we started living together in the barn. You didn't trust me, you were really mad at me and wanted me to leave. But, with time and effort, we made a new life on Earth. Then... Well, then..."

"Then I left you behind because I was too scared to face the Diamonds or another war. It was a huge mistake" Lapis intervened somberly.

"Yeah, and then you came back and helped us to defeat the Diamonds. And when we returned from Homeworld, you and I talked things through, you apologized and our relationship got better and stronger than before. We were happy, the three of us. Pumpkin, you and I... Until she passed away. And now that we're in this situation, I came to the conclusion that my feelings towards you are deeper and more meaningful than when we were friends..." Peridot swallowed, preparing herself for what she was going to say "W-What I'm trying to convey is that... I fell in love with you"

Lapis tightened her hug and smiled sweetly. "Me too. You're the best that happened in my life. I'm sorry if I didn't express it too much" at that Peridot snorted a bit "Well, that's the past now. We don't have to worry about it anymore"

"Peridot"

"Yeah?"

"This is off-topic but, do you really think we can't make it?"

Oh.

"W-Well... We don't know where to go, our powers are neutralized, we don't have a map and those things are looking for us. Also, our bodies are going through some unwanted, painful and mysterious changes. I still don't know if it is because of the creatures or some corruption-related problem. Besides, without Steven or his maternal unit's healing fountain, we can't be healed. BUT I just went into the hypothetical case of not surviving this ordeal because it could give more emphasis in what I wanted to tell you... My feelings towards you"

"This was a very touching confession from you part. It was much better than seeing Percy and Pierre taking many seasons to do it" Peri laughed at Lapis' reasoning a bit more at ease.

The blue gem then got up despite the numbness in her body. The gray spots had grown larger while she was unconscious, but she didn't care. Peridot got up too just to make sure her romantic partner (?) -is that how humans called them, right?- didn't collapse from exhaustion. "Are you sure you don't want some rest, Lapis? At this rate, you might poof"

"I haven't poofed yet, have I? Besides, you also need rest. Those weirds black lines in your body give me the creeps and a bad vibe about this"

"Hey, it's not my fault that my appearence isn't aesthetically pleasant for you!" Lapis laughed at her tantrum and invited Peri to be carried in her back, ignoring the throbbing waves of pain her gemstone emitted. However, the former technician noticed her distress and tried to protest in behalf of Lapis' health, but the ocean gem calmed her down with a kind look. The green gem swallowed worriedly while getting comfortable in Lapis' back.

"Maybe we should walk side by side. You can get exhausted"

"It's ok, Peri. Let's find a way out of here first, then we can deal with what's happening to our bodies"

"Problem number 1, though: there is no map"

Uh, right. They needed a direction.

'Ok, so, left? No, there is too much forest there. Right? The same, and maybe those things are there waiting for us. North? More forest and nothing. We have been walking and there is no sign of humans or gems around' Lapis sighed bitterly. How much she wished for this to end and sleep for a good, whole week to forget this ordeal.

Then she spot something pretty far away. It looked like a... No, wait, it WAS a mountain, but the dark gray sky made it difficult to see. However, with some focus, Lapis could not only notice it but also a bit of light shinning in the peak. That gave her an idea.

"Peri, look at that. Can you see that tiny light in the top of the mountain?"

"What mountain?" Lapis held Peridot's chin so her eyes were directed to where the svelte gem was watching. "Wait, wait" Peridot rubbed at her eyes to see better and then gasped "When that mountain appeared? We haven't seen it since this journey began!"

"The forest. It's too dense to see beyond the horizon, but this clearing makes it easier. I have an idea, or a theory, well either of both: what if that mountain is the limit of this forest? What if by reaching the light in the top, we can finally get out of here? Do you think it could work?"

Peridot placed a hand on her chin pensively. This could be a good idea and their only ticket to put an end to their senseless situation, or just a trap put by... Well, by whatever that was playing them like they were its toys. "Analytically speaking, we could save ourselves and even find answers about why our powers don't work and why our bodies are going through these changes, or die trying. But at least we have a goal now, a more tangible one, to be exact. So, yeah, it is worth a shot"

"It's settled then. To the mountain's light"

"Yeah, to the mountain's light!" Peridot exclaimed with renewed confidence though hissed a bit due to another migraine. Lapis grimaced after seeing her crush's gemstone getting more black splotches. She started walking fastly, praying this new plan of hers work for their sakes.

[turtletotem]

#so much happened those last two days at Canaan House#I lost track of just how much relationship upgrade Gideon and Harrow went through#Gideon goes from insisting Harrow is jealous over her and not envious (guarding something that's hers and not coveting something that isn't)#to lashing out at Harrow in the worst way she can manage without physical violence (threatening to leave her)#to assuming Harrow is a murderer and resolving to kill her herself rather than let anyone else touch her#to finding out Harrow had a good reason for everything she'd done and just didn't trust or respect Gideon enough to tell her#to finding out Harrow's worst secrets and swearing herself to Harrow#....in the span of about. mmmm. three hours? ish?#probably less#depends on how long she was wandering around or with the Sixth really#I'd say someone give that girl a nap but for once she actually got one (preserving OP's tags)

Actually. Looking at the chronology. The last time Gideon and Harrow talked alone before the pool scene, Gideon accused Harrow of being a jealous creep for telling her to stay away from Dulcinea.

A whole lot of stupifying things happened in between, but really, it wouldn't be surprising if her first panicked reaction to Harrow disrobing was to think Harrow was making a move on her. Relationship definitely hurtling toward something.