entrancelogs | + Guilt Runs Deep

"I don't wanna talk you out of it." That's a lie. She knows it's a lie. Malachite knows it's a lie, too, which is worse. "I... know I can't talk you out of it."

Better.

"But it's okay. We're all messed up. I've done bad things too. I've been awful to you, and you were right. It really couldn't just be fixed by me apologizing and saying things are different now- we really did have to work at it to really understand each other. You can't erase who you were. You can't unmake those decisions. We're stuck with them forever, even when we change. I get that now, but I don't feel bad for it. I learned from it."

"And I'm not you! That's the PROBLEM, isn't it?!"

That's definitely not the main problem. Maybe it is a little of it, in a certain sense. But Peridot is again clearly talking to Lapis, only Lapis, putting things in the usual context of her, and it makes Malachite shudder again. Because again, of course she is Lapis, and therefore she can't pretend the words are meaningless to her.

"I did this to myself. I hurt ourselves for so long that we couldn't stop." Ah, fusion pronouns. "I'm still doing it, and now I'm hurting YOU with it! And you don't deserve to get dragged into this mess!"

It's in this moment that Peridot wishes her fusion lesson had gotten further than 'I'm Percy and Pierre,' because her brain keeps getting overwhelmed by the idea that she is talking to Lapis and not Malachite, who she has not met, who she only knows as an amalgam eldritch nightmare created by Lapis and Jasper's combined rage. She doesn't know how to communicate with that.

So she sighs and plops down on the sand. "You're not hurting anything but my head," she growls, stubbornly. "But if I didn't want to be here, I wouldn't be. No one drags me anywhere. I'm my own gem! I do what I want! And I want to be part of this mess." Another sigh, this one louder. "Even a mess that contains trace amounts of Jasper."

This gets another long, angry glare as Malachite continues to grapple with the fact that she... really can't do anything about Peridot. Peridot, who is planting herself in here trying to throw everything off with her recontextualizations and her assurances, who will not be scared away by empty threats and can't be touched by real ones because too much of Malachite is Lapis. Peridot is absolutely too good for any of this.

This Malachite, maybe, isn't real. Malachite, in real life, never was very real. If she is anything, she could only be a name given to the overlap between Lapis and Jasper, and there always was overlap, wasn't there? Like any relationship, they were brought together by something they had in common, even if that particular something was a desire to exploit each other. And so were they held together by mutualities, their shared capacity for cruelty and bitterness and hatred. Those were the things they fed in each other and the places where they bled into each other.

So Malachite hates most things, because that's what she is, and none more than herself; but this iteration of her can't hate Peridot, and that's a horrendous weak spot. She's pretty mad about it too, but in the end that can't amount to anything more than a tantrum. She's never going to win an argument here, and she can't stop herself from listening.

"I can't get rid of you," she grumbles, reproachfully. "Why won't you just HATE me? I'm the monster that ate your friend."

"That's factually inaccurate." And here, Peridot thrives. She sees her own weakness to exploit- a fault in the framework. She glowers back, seeing the monster recede and leave behind someone struggling to maintain their control. She knows that look- she's worn it a time or two.

"You're the monster that is my friend." Because that's what Lapis (and Malachite) have been trying to get her to see, hasn't it? At the very least, it's something. "And I'm not going to hate you. I can't. You mean too much to me."

"Then that makes one of us."

Malachite closes all her eyes, gives a long petulant groan, and drops the rest of the way onto the beach among the rubble. Granted, there's a bit of a tremor when she does, but even a giant angry torso monster has to look a bit less intimidating lying on her belly in the sand.

When she opens her eyes again there's something a bit different in them, still defiant but less spiteful; searching. She brings one hand forward, moving slowly as if the mechanics of it are unaccustomed, and extends a pointer finger longer than Peridot is tall. It's going on top of Peridot's head. This could be considered a last test or threat or intimidation, but no part of Malachite really has any illusions that Peridot is going to duck out now. As easily as the little gem could be crushed into a fine powder, all she's getting is her hair mushed down. Honestly, there also aren't a lot of more complicated gestures one can pull off at this size difference.

But, then, there are a lot of things she can't do because she's like this. That's also the whole problem. Oh well.

When she speaks again she finally sounds a bit more like Lapis. "You're really just going to accept this, huh?"

Peridot, who has been anticipating being crushed this whole time and has come to expect it to be a natural end to the whole conversation somehow, just scrunches her eyes shut in grim acceptance and when all she gets is her hair smushed down, she breathes a sigh of relief and reaches up to pat the huge finger awkwardly.

"Yes. You're not the most unfortunate thing I've had to accept since defecting from Homeworld."

This is the point where the last of Malachite's anger, despite being what she is, melts away completely, helplessly. She pulls her hand back and stares at the spot that has been touched, flummoxed, as if she's never experienced anything like it before. Which is, of course, quite true to varying degrees in varying senses, depending on how you interpret things.

Then she shoots Peridot one last frown, just an actual sad one this time. It is very much a Lapis expression.

Then she shudders again, all over and a bit violently, and glows.

Unfusing is rarely graceful, even if the circumstances are a bit odd here, and Lapis lands flat on her back in the sand. In just a moment she levers up to her elbows, but she's pretty exhausted. Frankly that whole thing hurt her rockbrain too. She's probably still going to have to react or something, but give her a sec.

On the ground next to her is Jasper's gem.

Peridot waits until the glow from the fusion's destabilization fades entirely and only then does she stop counting grains of sand underneath her fingers. There's Lapis, on the ground. There's Jasper, inert and presently not an issue.

She resists the urge to run to her, and instead just slowly gets up and walks over, and once again, she extends her hand to offer her a hand up this time.

Her expression is twisted into sheepish worry. The world hasn't dissipated yet. She's not sure if this is fully over. Maybe it won't ever be. Maybe that's okay. "Did it work?"

Lapis looks up at the offered hand. It would be nice to say she can accept it gladly this time, but if there's one thing we've established today, it's that nothing's ever going to be that easy. Look, even without all the relationship drama, she just got manhandled by Jasper like several dozen times and there's definitely a part of her that would prefer to not touch anyone again for the next year. (That feeling will not actually last a year, fortunately. These two have held hands way more than that by now.)

She can, however, accept it at all, and that's a marked improvement. It's frustrating that it still kind of feels like she must be doing something wrong, that she can't just properly appreciate having someone so thoroughly on her side. But it's... it's such a damn miracle that the hand is somehow still there at all. If there's one thing she's established, it's that there is no way to mistake that for anything but good. Also, Lapis is sufficiently worn out that, while she can stand up under her own power, it might honestly take longer, and nobody needs this pointlessly protracted any more than it already has been.

'Did it work', like this was all a puzzle awaiting the right input to solve. The awful kicker is that it really was, too. Lapis doesn't answer that immediately. Helping her up feels like nothing, and her expression is unreadable, aside from her generally looking like a bit of a mess of a person. Regardless, she's coming along cooperatively. She casts an uncertain glance at Jasper's disembodied gem; it's unclear whether Lapis knew it was there or just now noticed it. But then it's back to what's in front of her. When she does speak it's quiet, as if all the shouting that didn't come from her throat tired that out too, but she answers dutifully, because she owes that much. "I think so."

Peridot is not nearly as exhausted by all of this as Lapis has, having just borne witness to the whole thing rather than experiencing it, but there's a clear weight off her tiny shoulders and she looks relieved, if not a bit paler green than usual.

Despite knowing that Lapis has been manhandled a lot and that touch is probably way too much right now, especially intense physical contact, Peridot still drops Lapis's hand and goes for the hug. It's brief and she pulls back almost instantly, rather than let it linger too long and potentially force Lapis to push her away.

"Good," she says. And then, because that feels underwhelming as a response, she adds, "I'm glad."

Lapis is completely unmoving during the hug, which is at least better than pushing away even if it's sorta like hugging a mannequin. That's definitely something she can't really appreciate right now; she understands the gesture, but viscerally it feels like she doesn't. Again, very frustrating. But that too is kind of a summary of this whole thing.

"Peridot," she says, still quietly, but now because she also has to struggle to figure out the words she wants to say. Well, besides an obvious one or two. "Thank you. This, and... you help me so much. You're always helping me, and I'm..."

Never going to be able to repay it. Not even always able to accept it gracefully.

Going to keep having these things happen, all this drama and messy unsolvable problems, going to keep on needing to be bailed out.

Nothing like you.

Not worth it, maybe. But she doesn't get to decide that.

It's frustrating. Because she knows, she does, that Peridot doesn't care. But maybe someone SHOULD. Maybe she does. Her fists tighten.

She has no idea how to end that sentence, ultimately. Peridot already knows perfectly well what she is, and other than the frustration she could dredge up more of, Lapis just feels hollowed-out. The only thing she can see how to accomplish right now is more arguing in the circles she already ceded. "Let's get out of here."

Peridot pulls back a bit, canting her head and looking a bit like she's autofilling various endings to that sentence somewhere behind her shaded eyes, and none of them are what Lapis is thinking, and to find that out would probably baffle her and set the situation back on its axis to revolve in circles again.

She casts guilt aside like a tool she doesn't need anymore. Already it's filed away neatly with Homeworld sensibilities and casual gem classism- these feelings I have for these things I've done don't matter to me and shouldn't matter to anyone else.

Lapis does not have a brain that files things away neatly. Lapis's brain is a tempest in a teapot, scattering baggage and guilt every which way, but there's just not enough room to hurl it so far that she can't find it again. They'll be here again. They've only stopped this Hell.

Peridot doesn't care. The scene fades and they're back in the barn with only the memory that were storms here once. It still tastes like salty sea air and the ground still feels gritty under her feet, and she makes a face. All the words she could have said before are abruptly replaced with mild disdain as she looks at their room. "We're... probably going to have to borrow another room for the weekend. The barn is a little... unfortunate right now."

Edited 2019-05-02 22:38 (UTC)

+ Guilt Runs Deep

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