Tag: Zircon

Blue Zircon continues to be extremely confused, Gravescratch attempts to remedy this. Also, nature happens rather loudly. Part 2 of https://bettsplendens.tumblr.com/post/161343231179/an-experimental-weapon-noodle-obtains-a-very. 

3281 words, warning for a “I am property” mindset. 

Zircon woke slowly, confused, but couldn’t bring herself to
be frightened of whatever this was.
She had been… unconscious? Which should be concerning, but she was fine. Just… waking up. No pain, none of
that lingering unpleasantness that came with re-forming, body still where she’d
put it.

Uncurling a bit, Zircon rubbed her eyes in an effort to
reboot her brain, then shook her head and looked up at-

Oh, right, this thing with way too many eyes. Which… hadn’t
eaten her yet, apparently didn’t intend to, and was currently reading a… thing.
A small object, made of extremely thin pieces of something moderately flexible,
that had what looked like some sort of writing on each piece.

“That looks inefficient.” Was her first thought, and not one
she quite managed to contain. It did look
inefficient!

“Yes, well, I do not keep data storage devices over my face.
Besides- the locals here are only just beginning to migrate all reading data to
digital form, it is a rather recent invention. This is what they use instead,
it is called a ‘book’. Perfectly serviceable, albeit inefficient compared to
the tech you are used to.”

Having calmly explained himself, Gravescratch set the book
aside and looked down at his lap full of public defender, taking in the utterly
confused expression. “And you were
just asleep. Sleep is a state of mind and body, mandatory for the physical and
mental health of many organic creatures, which Gems also benefit from despite
not being organic. It is not necessary, but it is helpful for mental health, particularly
among those under high stress. Homeworld discourages it and hides the knowledge
due to it being seen as unproductive. It is something like meditation- the mind
relaxes, all conscious thought ceasing, and the body largely relaxes. Consider
it a reboot. You were terribly confused and upset, but now- better, yes?”

Zircon elected not to answer. Mostly because she did not
want to admit that, yes, she was feeling better now. Or… comment on her
emotions and what had just happened.

Except, actually-

What exactly, had-

Zircon had several questions, but they were all derailed by
something… chiming? Chirping?

The chirping turned out to be coming from a small, blue,
fluttering creature, something that was perched on the back of her former
hiding place. It would have fit in her palm, its coloration was startlingly
close to hers, and it kept making rather pleasant sounds as it bounced around
on two tiny limbs.

New question.

“…what is that?”  

“Ah, there it is. That, little one, is a ‘bluebird’. Birds
are small, avian, organic creatures found across this planet. There are several
thousand different species, ranging from the size of your finger to about the
size of your torso, in many different colors. That is a small local species. It
is supposed to be outside, but it found its way inside earlier and I did not
wish to pursue it for fear of harming it. They are very fragile. I would like
to put it outside, as that is where it belongs, so, if you will pardon me…”

Gravescratch gently tipped Zircon out of his lap and stood
up, circling around the wall of the room until he was near a section of a soft
wall hanging. Pulling it aside, he revealed a transparent section of the wall,
which he opened- letting in a good deal of humidity, a gust of moving wind, and
more sounds similar to the first creature’s sound. “Yes, yes, here you are- you
can leave now, bird.” Gravescratch declared, turning to look at the bird- and
blinked all seven eyes in mild surprise as another bluebird flew in.

Both Gems stared at the new invader for a moment, then
Gravescratch shook his head, sighed, and turned back towards the window. “That
was exactly the opposite effect I had intended this to have, so- little one,
please stay in here, I am going to encourage them to leave.”

Zircon wasn’t watching the “birds” any more. Her attention
was now on the opening in the wall through which her kidnapper had just left. Slowly
standing up, she carefully approached the opening, staying to the side so the
strange thing might not see her looking out.

That was… a lot of green. A lot of bright, bright green. The
sky was a bizarre soft blue with moving patches of white, and the ground was a
fuzzy green that her eyes couldn’t properly focus on. This was far too large to
be another room, so- apparently that was what the planet looked like. Now-
which one was this? Had she seen any images of a planet like this?

She had not.

That was a bad sign. So was the lack of anything even resembling
Homeworld tech. Or anything coherent, everything
was fuzziness and rounded edges and-

Apparently the ground came apart. Her captor was scraping
away the green, revealing a layer of dark brown, and he did it with no visible
effort.

Gravescratch cleared away a patch of the green, then sat
back and stared up at the sky, waiting until-

After a short time, another few bluebirds came fluttering
down, landing on the exposed patch of brown. Making sounds very loud compared
to their tiny frames, they bounced around in the brown and plucked at it as if
searching for something, completely ignoring the lanky thing standing near
them.

A few moments later, the birds inside seemingly heard the
sounds, chirped in response, and flew outside, joining the others in the
exposed patch.

Gravescratch gave a satisfied hum, but didn’t come back
inside, just sat down and watched the birds- especially as more, of differing
colors and sizes, appeared.

Her captor was distracted. Distracted, and facing away from
her. With an opening to the outside still available.

But her captor looked very fast, wasn’t far away, and was
familiar with the local area. She was not made to be fast, and she didn’t even know
what planet she was on.

Running was a bad idea. It was a very bad idea.

So… was staying here a better idea?

She didn’t trust the strange thing that had captured her,
and she still had no doubt that it was going to hurt her. It seemed calm now,
though, whereas running would risk making it angry with her.

But… if it was angry, it might just get whatever it was
planning over with. Which, given that she had no hope of rescue, would probably
be better than it toying with her for however long it intended.

And this might actually work.

Staying here, she had no hope of escape.

Trying to run would give her the tiniest scrap of hope.

Which was something that she needed.

So, shakily, Zircon crept over to the opening in the wall.
One last check to be sure the creature wasn’t watching, then she clambered
outside, dropping to the ground.

She didn’t stop to look around. Partly because she couldn’t, her eyes couldn’t focus
properly on all the incoherent shapes around her. She just set off in one
direction, as quietly as possible, heading towards what looked like cover. A
series of objects much larger than her, blobs of nonsensical green patterns
supported by relatively straight grey-brown columns. Hopefully she could hide
among some of those. She just had to get there.

Zircon tried to be quiet, at least until she was away from
the building, but the ground kept making sounds.
Unpleasant squishing noises from everything she stepped on, urgh. Worse
than that, she ended up yelping as a small, bullet-shaped creature leapt out of
the ground and hit her in the face, and there was no way her captor hadn’t
heard-!

Time to run. Zircon abandoned all attempts at secrecy and
just bolted, panic fueling her as she ran for cover. Maybe if she just got a
head start, got ahead of it far enough, she could escape-!

Unbelievably, it seemed to be working. When she finally risked
a glance over her shoulder from between the columns, nothing was following her.
It wasn’t there. Maybe it- could she
have escaped its notice?

Maybe it hadn’t been watching because it hadn’t expected her
to run.

Well, she’d showed it!

Zircon had time for a moment of satisfaction before a crashing sound registered. Slow,
powerful, and repetitive- coming from somewhere in front of her.

Was that good? It might provide an opportunity to escape a potential
tracker’s hearing, but it might also present another threat. Except that it
almost sounded like… water.

She was a Gem of Blue Diamond’s court. Water was a good thing for her.

And she was too tired to run.

So she kept walking in a straight line, slowly, cautiously,
as the blue of the sky started to show up again and the crashing grew louder,
and she kept walking until she ran out of ground to walk on.

The ground fell away. Not even in a sensible fashion, with
hovercraft docks or any sort of transport, it just stopped being ground and
turned into open air. “Of course. Because nothing here makes any sense.” Zircon
muttered, staring out at the sky in front of her that seemed to somehow stretch
below the horizon, and-

Wait. There was a
line. But the ground was almost the same color as the sky out near the horizon,
except that it was moving, white
lines rippling across it towards her.

Oh, her eyes were not made for this. She was made to operate
in well-constructed buildings that made
sense, to process data at high speeds, not to stare out at messily shaped
things that someone had put far away.

But, squinting, she managed to make out what was in front of
her.

Water.

More water than she’d seen in her entire life, stretching
from horizon to horizon around the outcropping she was standing on. There were
waves rippling across the surface of the water towards her, crashing against
the base of the outcropping far below her. As she watched, a massive grey
creature broke the surface of the water, sent a white spout from its back, and
sank again, and more birds –these larger and grey- drifted across her
view.  

“What in Blue Diamond’s name…”

“Oh, she had nothing to do with this.”

Zircon gave a very undignified yelp and jolted in place,
very nearly jumping right off of the outcropping. Whirling around with her arms
up as a futile shield, she backed up until she was right at the edge, trying to
escape the punishment she was certain was coming for her escape attempt-

But nothing happened. Her captor twitched towards her, as if
about to grab, but didn’t touch her. Just- waited. Staring. And did nothing.

It unnerveed her enough that she ended up blurting out “well?!”
up at the thing, then immediately regretted it and covers her gem with both arms,
which unfortunately left her with no good way to hide her face.

“I am not going to grab you.” Gravescratch rumbled, taking
one long step back, and sat down- out of reach of her. “Unless I feel that you
are in danger otherwise, I am going to respect your bodily autonomy as much as
I can. And I am not going to harm you for running, understand? You are not in
trouble. I do not blame you for running, either, although I do need you to
return. And, preferably step away from the cliff before you fall off.”

Bodily autonomy?

She knew what those words meant, separately, but- together,
and in this context?

And why didn’t her captor intend to punish her for this? She
ran, which is precisely what she was
told not to do- it would make sense for her to be punished, why wouldn’t-
not that she’s complaining, of course, but-

The only logical part of that was the suggestion that she should
move away from the cliff. She did so, forcing herself to walk closer to the thing that so effortlessly found her,
and tried to draw herself up as she spoke to it.

“You make no sense. Explain yourself at- at once! You have kidnapped me, why- why wouldn’t you- and- ‘bodily autonomy’,
what do-“

She didn’t want to get closer, but she did, moving slowly towards the thing as if drawn by a magnet. “And
what did- did you do to me? How are you
making me feel like- nnh-“

“I did not do anything to you. As I said before, little one-
you are a member of a social species, in a society that forbids affection. You
are terribly touch-starved. That contact earlier helped, and now, whether or
not you intend to, you are searching for more. Easy… I am not going to hurt
you.” Gravescratch rumbled, leaning in slightly, and pressed his muzzle to her
forehead when she was close enough. “I am sorry- I do not mean to upset you,
but, as I am not causing this, I have no way to stop it.”

Eyes shutting, Zircon took the final step closer, hands
curling into fists as she tried to fight the urge to get closer. She did not
succeed. The best she could manage was not hugging
the thing that had brought her to this planet against her will, the thing
that could shatter and eat her if it
so chose, the thing that-

That was explaining again. She should listen. Explanations
were good.

“You are not in trouble because your reaction is
understandable. You are frightened of me, and for good reason. I would have
been shocked if you did not make some escape attempt. Now… bodily autonomy. A
concept that is going to seem very strange to you, because it goes against
everything that the Diamonds encourage. It is, to put it simply, the idea that
you have the right to decide what happens to your body. You have the right to
decide who is allowed to touch you, what they are allowed to do, and when they stop.
You have the right to decide what you are comfortable doing and what you are
not, and no one, even the Diamonds,
can change that.”

Gravescratch lowered his head just enough to meet Zircon’s
eyes, or, at least, enough to meet her eyes if she would open them. “No one has
the right to manipulate or control you in any way, save only what is necessary
to prevent serious harm to you or someone else. Why I refrained from grabbing
you away from the cliff just now, for example- you were not in serious enough
danger to warrant me capturing you in such an alarming fashion. I am trying to
respect your autonomy as much as I can. Which is why I am not holding you- I am
concerned that it would distress you further.”

Explanations were still good.  Except when they only made things more confusing.

The Diamonds were entitled to whatever they wanted of her.
Anything and everything- theirs.

Or… maybe not so much the Diamonds any more.

She’d been taken, removed to another planet, and there was
no one en route to rescue her. Which meant, legally, she belonged to… this.

So, instead of faceplanting into its front, she probably
ought to show the proper respect.

Drawing herself up as much as possible, Zircon took a step
back and squared her shoulders, looking up at the being who towered over her. “Ma’am.
With all due respect- in accordance with Right of Conquest laws, you literally own me. What you are saying
makes absolutely no sense. You have every right to do- literally whatever you
want. I- there are- there are some things I would not recommend, and things I would
not prefer, but- I have no rights
here.”

“That again.”
Gravescratch rumbled, eyes narrowing, and leaned down to properly meet her
gaze. “Listen to me. I do not have any right to control you. I did not earn the
right to manipulate you by having the skills to capture you, and the Diamonds
did not earn the right to manipulate anyone
simply by being born as a certain variety of Gem. No matter what they
claim, that does not give them any right to anything
they are doing. But that is unimportant for now. What I need you to
understand is that you have rights. You
have the right to tell me to stop anything
that you do not like. And I am not inclined to take orders, but you may make
requests. Go on- try it out.”

…what?

Zircon didn’t manage to restrain
her expression of bewilderment, mostly because all of her brainpower was going
into trying to puzzle this out. First of all- the Diamonds had every right to
do whatever they wanted, with everything that they owned, and they owned an
extremely large number of things. Second, her captor –owner- had every right to- again, anything. This made no sense, but-

There was an order near the end of
that confusing paragraph. Probably another part of this twisted game, but… an
order. “Try it out”, referring to, presumably, her hypothetical ability to make
requests of her owner.

So… she tried it out.

Stared up at whatever this was,
tried to stay steady, and spoke as clearly as she could. Which… wasn’t very,
given her request. “Hold me. Ma’am. I- I still
think something happened to cause
this, but- I want- hold me.”

“There we are. Good. Assert
yourself- I promise I will not be angry with you.” Gravescratch rumbled, all
seven eyes shutting momentarily in a gesture of approval, and wrapped his arms
gently around Zircon’s frame. Pulling her just a bit closer, he rumbled gently
and hugged her with all four arms, giving quiet approving sounds every time she
moved to increase the area of contact.

Zircon slumped limp in her owner’s
hold, shutting her eyes for just a few seconds so that she could properly bask
in the sensation of touch, and…
stayed like that for far longer than she meant to. Oh. Intimidating or not,
this thing was warm, and it was
supporting her oh-so-well, and she wanted-

She wanted to curl in close and
get comfortable and never move away, wanted
to stay like this and hold this creature and
never let go, and it scared her that
she wanted anything so strongly-

She wanted more, but she wanted to stop,
and the twisting desires escaped as a soft whimper before she started to
claw at her owner’s front- trying to get away, trying to hide somewhere so she
could figure this out on her own without being touched in a way that made her
mind want to short out. “Stop, stop-“

To her shock, the creature did. It let go, it stepped back
slightly, and it crouched, making no effort to get closer to her again.

“Yes, like that- good!”
Gravescratch crooned, looking genuinely pleased, and took a step away. “Come
on- away from the cliff, please. And, preferably, back to the building- come
inside and sit, enjoy the electric blanket, sit somewhere away from all the
nature so you can think.”

Her owner obeyed when she tried to make a situation stop. Now that… that had to be part of a game, some kind of
trick, some kind of trap, but-

But the ground kept making noises,
and little things flung themselves out of it at her, and she wanted to be
somewhere that did not have anywhere near this many living creatures. So… she’d
obey. She’d go back inside.

And she was going to use every
step of the way back to try and puzzle this out.