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“Fuse with me, Peridot!”
The reality of this nightmare is making Jasper’s voice even louder and angrier than it really is. Steven says he sometimes has dreams where he is sure that everything’s real… For me, it’s not like that, I can always tell dream and reality apart – however, sometimes my feelings get very intense in dreams. Even if it’s clear that Peridot is safe… How do I leave her, how do I not run to save her?
Jasper collapses on one knee in front of a small green figure, begs and begs again, tries to reach her hands in a hungry, predatory manner, to catch her, to force her to fuse but I’m spreading my wings already, I’ll be there in a second. How dare you attack a non-combatant? No one gets to hurt my Peridot – be that real or not! Those who try to do it will answer for it, they will answer to me!
I land right in front of Peridot, shielding her with my wings. No, you don’t!
“Lapis!” Peridot cries behind my back and quickly adds, “Be careful!”
Her voice is full of worry and… something else, something I’ve been dreaming of for a long time. Something she never told me about, and she never will. Though, here, in dream realm… Peridot is not just worried about me. She is in love with me.
“Leave her alone! Go back where you came from!” I cry furiously and prepare myself to battle. The sweet voice – “Be careful!” – is echoing in my head, filling my heart with boldness and joy, making my fingertips ticklish with magic. Anyone who hurts my friends will pay for her foolishness, but… The one who hurts my Peridot will pay with her life.
Following the logic of this dream, two ponds appear by my side, and I stretch out water magic to chain Jasper’s arms. You will pay for everything! More and more links form a strong net, it covers Jasper’s shoulders, her whole body, pulls her downward, and very soon she cannot move a muscle.
“You… will not win!” she sputters, squinting angrily. No matter how hard she strains, the chains hold her securely. “You… traitor… a flawed gem! You act like a hero, but you know… that you’re just a weakling!”
And suddenly her hateful stare pierces through me, paralyzing my whole body. My legs fail, the world goes black. I fall on my knees. No… I must protect… Peridot. I will do anything to save her, she’ll be safe, it’s going to be okay! My magic is stronger than anybody… But the memories come flooding in, like an unstoppable wave.
I’m at the bottom of the ocean once again.
Immobilized. Scared. In the dark.
An unbearable weight is pulling me down, the fear is suffocating me, I cannot remember anything but darkness and pain. Nothing of this is real… You can break free! Be strong, Lapis! And still, I can barely think straight, my vision narrows, leaving nothing but the enemy’s sinister eyes, my weakness, and desperation. At the last second, I feel somebody hugging me tight from behind, trying to help me get back on my feet… But I’ve already slipped into the dark and the unconsciousness. The world drifts away.
I come to my senses, seeing everything around me in a fog. It’s very gloomy and it takes me at least a minute to try to realise how the battle ended. Finally, I can see a familiar face appearing from the grayness and, for some reason, a barn’s walls behind that person who says in a loud whisper:
“Lapis! Lapis, are you okay?”
It’s Peridot’s troubled face above me. I heave a relieved sigh, check her gem carefully, get up, trying to see any traces of recent shock on her face, but it looks like she’s totally fine.
Peridot… you are alright.
I cannot force myself to look away from her face and ask just to be sure:
“Is it still a dream?”
Giving me a slightly crooked smile, Peridot shakes her head.
“You’re awake now. Don’t you worry. It was just a nightmare.”
I feel my cheeks blushing and look down quickly. And think what could happen if I didn’t ask her…
“How do you feel? You screamed in your sleep,” – Peridot says so worriedly that I struggle not to look at her again. “Do you want to tell me?”
I lower my head, feeling ashamed, and answer quietly:
“No.”
Peridot accepts it, softly reminds me that she wants to make another meep morp so she’ll be around all night, wishes me some nice dreams… and leaves me alone.
I want to call her, but I know I won’t be able to come up with a good enough reason for her to lie with me for a while. My cheeks are still burning, and I pull the sheets above my head. I tell her so little! What if she decides I don’t care about her or that I don’t want her attention? I try to calm myself down, thinking that this way she won’t know how much I want to just be with her – but the sadness, mixed with pain, stays in my chest.
Listening to the tools’ tinkling, I eventually fall into another dream.
This time I find myself on a warship, I can even see Homeworld’s tall spires in the portholes, the portals’ unnatural lighting and ugly cracks in the crust. I pull back – I see the suffering of a destroyed ecosystem, I can almost feel its pain. I need to leave, I need to fly away, to the other side of the galaxy, anywhere at all, but my gem is cracked once again, I am almost powerless. The warship is bringing me closer to Homeworld by the second, closer to the planet I hate, the planet where there’s no place for me... The planet that lives under the Diamonds’ tyranny.
I rush to the closest passage, looking for an escape pod. I’m shaking with anger and fear. It cannot be, it’s just a dream, but – I cannot force myself to even think about what happens when the Diamonds capture me. When the Diamonds capture… Peridot! She must be somewhere around here too, somewhere on the ship! Who cares about what happens to me, what matters is what they’re going to do to her when they find out she failed the mission!
Empty passages branch and change in size. The walls are almost crashing me; the next second they suddenly expand and disappear in the distance. However confusing that is, this reality will not defeat me, though. No, I don’t have any powers, but I can be myself here, and I don’t have to hide.
“Peridot! Peridot!” My scared voice is echoing back. “Peridoot!”
I’m going to find you no matter what… you will help me to not lose my mind in this crazy nightmare, I will help you, and we will run to where it’s safe!
“Peridot!”
“Lapis?” A distant voice reaches me. “I’m here, Lapis! Help me!”
In just a few seconds I turn into a hallway where I finally see my Peridot. To my horror, she is trapped under some rubble. Where did it come from? Is the ship falling apart? Whatever, it doesn’t matter, we just need to get out of here until it’s too late. I can see Peridot, I can see her terrified, pained expression, and I run to her. I need to be quick… We can do it. We can definitely do it.
“Hang on, Peri… I just need a second, it’s going to be alright,” I stammer, trying to pick the giant slab up. There’s an ugly lump of fear in my chest. I feel the urge to look at a porthole to see if we have at least few more minutes – and suddenly we hear a horribly loud rumble, and the lights go off . We both scream, but the warship is still holding together. In the semi-darkness I run back over to Peridot and struggle to pick the slab up again from another side.
“I’m going to help you… Don’t be scared, alright?”
“I’m not,” she tells me. I can hear her smiling against all odds. “We’ve already found each other, right? Everything’s going to be fine now.”
I don’t know how much time passes. I feel like I will poof from this incredible effort, but Peridot asks me gently to calm down and try once more; then she cries out in pain and I’m the one to try to comfort her, to beg for her to wait for just a little bit more.
Then it’s the last desperate pull – get out, quick! – and Peridot is free. I help her up, and the next second we’re holding each other so, so tightly, and she’s laughing lightly despite all the horrors of my nightmare, she’s laughing in her wonderful croaky manner. I run my hand through her hair… She’s rubbing my back slightly, circling my gem. I know it is just a dream, but I want to hold her for ever. The truth is, it is just in my dreams that I can touch her… without the fear of being rejected.
The warship is shaking again, and I snap out of it.
“We need to get out of here! Quickly, before it…”
But Peridot answers me quietly:
“It’s too late. We cannot do anything.”
Sadly, I know that she is right.
The skyscrapers of Homeworld are rapidly growing in front of us. We are all alone on the ship that is coming uncontrollably at the prison tower. Even if we knew how to turn it… We’ve got seconds before we crash.
I find Peridot’s hand, and we lace our fingers. Yellow, blue, white spires behind the glass are all a blur of a kaleidoscope. Just a couple of seconds before the impact.
For some reason, I calm down and whisper:
“I love you.”
I close my eyes.
“I love you,” Peridot repeats in the dark.
The first thing I feel is something soft that I lie on.
Then I open my eyes and see that I am not in a palace and not even in a prison. Somehow, we must have escaped and now are probably hiding underground.
Next comes the hearing.
“Lapis! Come on, Lapis!”
I wince, lean on my elbow, and try to put together all the pieces of what I remember. It looks like… it looks like we survived after all.
“Are we safe? Is it still… a dream?” I ask weakly. Peridot hesitates for a second and then nods. “Good…”
I smile to myself, sit up swiftly, cup her face, and stroke her lips with mine.
For some time, nothing exists. There’s just blackness and some nice feeling way down and in my wrists, it’s warm and a bit ticklish, I think Steven might have told me about it – but I can’t recall the name. To be honest, I don’t care what people call it. It might be called a morp meep as well.
After a while I pull back and open my eyes. Peridot is frozen, her eyes squeezed shut. Her cheeks are not at all the color they usually are.
“Oh my stars,” she whispers, with her eyes still closed. “I hope we spend some more time in this dream.”
I chuckle and kiss her nose softly. If only it was not a dream… Well, maybe it really will be long and nice. Don’t I deserve just a little happiness for a change?
I look around and finally start to realise that something is off. It’s not the walls of the Kindergarten around me, it’s not the sparkly buildings of Homeworld… but the familiar wooden walls. What is that? Did the magic of dreaming take me to the barn?
“How – how did we get here?” I ask slowly.
Peridot doesn’t answer.
“Where are we, Peri? Are we still in danger? Where is… Jasper?”
She bites her lip, as if trying to hide her smile, then looks down and shakes her head. There’s a glimpse of doubt in my head… after a second, sheer horror… then astonishment.
Peridot glances at me, looking a little ashamed, and explains:
“You were crying in your sleep again, you looked so helpless… I decided to tell you that you’re still asleep but that now your dream was a good kind of dream. I thought you’d calm down, maybe fall back asleep and have a nice dream… In a way, that’s what happened,” she continues, smiling widely.
I’m so embarrassed I don’t know what to say.
“And you – you don’t mind?”
“I don’t,” she tells me happily. “I’ve always thought it was just a stupid alternative to fusion for organic clods like Polette…”
“Do you still think so?” I interrupt and wait for her answer, not daring to breathe.
“I don’t,” Peridot repeats.
She touches my shoulder gently, crawls over me on all fours, settles down on the bed and generously pats on the spot by her side.
It looks like I was wrong, after all… I thought I could always tell apart reality and dreams, knowing that it’s only in my dreams that I can be happy.
Turns out, it’s a bit different.