alienwear | (no subject)

It's been a rough ride since she came here, what with all the... learning she's had to do. Not having powers, or rather, not having her usual set of abilities as well as being thrown to an entirely, wildly different place from the home she'd finally started making for herself, has been hard.

Very, very hard.

But she's been adjusting! Slowly, in that uncomfortable way where no matter what she does she just feels wrong in her own-- well, it's skin now, isn't it?

Lapis opens the door, wondering just what could be the issue with Peridot with all of these things running concurrently through her head.

All of which stops the moment she locks eyes with Peridot.

"Uh. Do you know what a light is?"

"Lapis!" Peridot cries exuberantly when she walks in. She'd been braced to attack when that door first creaked open, just on sheer instinct, but Lapis is one of only two people allowed access to her hoard at any given time. Upon confirming that it's her, Peridot bound and glides safely over the clusters of plants around the room and whumps onto the floor in front of Lapis, apparently too excited to walk over there like a normal gem.

"I don't need a light!" She trills happily, answering that sarcastic question for her. She circles the other gem like a cat, brushing her with her wing and nudging her way under her right arm. Lapis can probably feel the bubbling affection coming off of her in waves over the magical connection that binds them. "I'm glad you could join me up here! I'm feeling absolutely horrible," she says brightly.

"Some people still do." Lapis replies, flatly, though is nearly knocked off balance by one (1) apparently exuberant Gem Dragon, who is nudging and butting her in ways that seem very common for a household pet.

It's a little weird!

The affection is nice though, soothing as it is.

"You don't seem like you're feeling absolutely horrible." In fact, Peridot seems perfectly fine to her. More than fine, and Lapis pushes against Peridot slightly in an attempt to maybe reclaim some space, but like, she's not trying too hard.

"Perhaps 'horrible' isn't the most accurate descriptor," Peridot admits with a slight frown. "'Restless' rings slightly more true."

And indeed it does; Peridot keeps swishing her tail around, back and forth, back and forth across the floor, positively radiating an ambient restless energy. She takes a bit of a step back, either sensing that Lapis wants a bit of space, or perhaps realizing that she's behaving in a kind of embarrassingly touchy feely way. Maybe a bit of both.

"You can turn on a light if you want to, though! Doesn't bother me. I just wanted to spend time with you really badly for some reason! Normally I would have just come to you, but..." She gestures at her hoard with one wing. "I cant leave all of my charges unprotected on a night like this!"

It's definitely both. But Lapis doesn't dwell on it, because the restlessness radiating off of Peridot is in turn making her restless, like some sort of horrible feedback loop.

"Well... I guess you're right. It wouldn't be good if someone got their hands on our plants." That Lapis may or may not be in the process of trying to learn to magic into soldiers. Which, really, is kind of what they always wanted, in a way?

She moves to turn on the light, because unlike Peridot, Lapis hasn't yet unlocked her powers of seeing in the dark.

"Technically my plants," Peridot corrects her, a bit of that dragon possessiveness creeping in. It's out of her mouth without her really thinking about it. Fortunately she explained to Lapis a while ago that her monster changes can make her act like this, so hopefully she doesn't take too much offense. "But yes. I have to maintain constant vigilance, in case some ill-intentioned faun or puca somehow manages to get in here."

She wrings her claws distractedly while she talks, keeping her distance from Lapis even though she's increasingly and uncomfortably aware that for some reason she like, REALLY wants to be near her right now. Physically near. Not just in the same room as her. Like she wants to sweep the witch up in her wings and add her to her hoard. It's extremely weird. Is this normal? Do all dragons act like this with their bonded?

"Our plants. Sharing is caring. Also we're bonded." Which she still doesn't entirely understand, but Lapis more or less just passes it off as still being barnmates but now with weird psychic powers attached.

"You know, I'm pretty sure a puca or a faun isn't really interested in what's in here. You've left it before and nothing bad has happened." She says carrying on the conversation even if Peridot might not enjoy the whole 'our' aspect. Or agree with it.

She snorts at the insistence on sharing, going over to one of her favorite plants and protectively tenting her wings around it. She looks up at Lapis again with a shocked expression when she implies she might be being overprotective, though. "Never on a full moon night," Peridot protests, looking scandalized. "And that's when I have to worry the most! Monsters start acting absolutely cracked on nights like these!"

Says the gem currently sheltering a peace lily like it's a newborn hatchling.

"You mean like you're doing? Right now?" Lapis motions to said peace lily enclosed by Peridot's wings. "Look, has anyone broken in before on a full moon to steal your plants?"

She fully expects the answer to be 'No', because honestly, she can't exactly fathom why anyone would steal Peridot's plants. They're not even enchanted to do cool things!

Yet, anyway.

Lapis can likely feel some of the shame that Peridot's starting to feel under her insistence.

"It... I mean," she stammers, turning her head away from her an agonized expression for a moment before looking back. "That doesn't matter, because the point is that someone easily could!" she protests firmly, thumping her tail on the floorboards just once.

It doesn't really matter how hard Lapis tries to present the more rational view on things. At the end of the day, dragons are gonna dragon, and Peridot can't help but feel this way around this time of the month. Lapis calling her out on it is only serving to make her feel flustered and embarrassed about her condition.

Edited 2019-09-12 02:27 (UTC)

"Come on, Peridot. It'll be fine if we, I don't know, just go to another room? Then if I'm wrong you can charge in very heroically to rescue your plants." Which Lapis has a very strong feeling won't happen, but she's trying to reassure Peridot.

"I'll also see if I can't curse whoever breaks in if it happens too. I'm sure we could come up with a very fitting punishment for whoever would dare to do such a thing too." Not that she's sure she can, but again, she's trying to placate Peridot! Because this probably isn't healthy.

She wants to believe Lapis, and some of the reassurance comes through strongly enough over their bond that she kind of feels it too. "But--" she starts, and then breaks off, eyes flicking down and away before flicking back up to search her friend's face. "Why do we have to leave, though? You don't mind it in here, right?"

"I don't mind it here, but I'm pretty sure that if I show you that it'd be fine to leave them alone with nothing disastrous happening it'll be easier on you if you have to leave later." It's a friend thing.

She holds a hand out to Peridot. "And like I said, we'll just be in the other room if I'm absolutely horrifically wrong and someone does come and try and steal your plants. And Pumpkin will be there too." The absolutely ferocious creature.

"But..."

Peridot trails off and looks away, anxiously wringing her claws. There's a lingering anxiety there, even with Lapis's most sincere reassurances. It's not clear what the precise source is until Peridot finally speaks up:

"Look, logically I know that it is highly unlikely that something will happen to these plants, but. Logic doesn't matter in this case! There's a part of me now that I have NO control over, which insists that I HAVE to stay here," she explains. "And the harder I try to push back against that instinct, the harder IT pushes back against ME. If I resist too hard it could make me go feral!"

"C'mon, Peridot, you won't go feral. Besides, that's not how it works out anyway. It'll be just like in CPH, where everyone finds out that Pierre is a werewolf, and he's afraid of hurting people but Percy inevitably calms him down and together they conquer his fears and win the scavenger hunt. Except it's less of a scavenger hunt and more of a "Just Be In The Next Room" kind of thing."

She keeps her hand outstretched to Peridot. "We like, can even take, like, baby steps." Lapis says, using her very impressive rendition of Percy's voice.

Peridot tries to interrupt to insist that no, she really might go feral, that she is NOT being paranoid, and that this is an actual possibility that is a well documented result of fighting too hard against one's monstrous instincts. She's not sure how she can convey that, how she can make Lapis understand.

But... She also wants to believe that life can be like an episode of Camp Pining Hearts. That any problem is surmountable just with a strong will and good friends to help you out. And she never could stay frustrated whenever Lapis put on her Percy voice.

She groans dubiously, clearly still thinking that this is a bad idea, but reaches out and takes her hand anyway.

See? It's not so bad. Lapis' hand closes on Peridot's, and she gently tugs her backwards. One step at a time.

"See? It's not so bad. And it's not like we have to do it fast or anything, we can just go slow and wait for things to calm down, just like they did." She's trying to be very, very reassuring here, because it's definitely what Peridot needs, and she has 100% trust in her best friend not attempting to shatter her.

Friendship is ~~magic~~ powerful, and Steven himself has demonstrated this on many occasions. Surely this is also a spot where friendship will win over everything else.

Peridot flashes a brief, weak smile as she follows along, but remains uncharacteristically quiet. She still looks anxious, kept in check only by the feedback of Lapis's constant reassurance.

Things get dicier the closer they get to the door, though. Peridot's ears twist and flatten, her ruff twitches with alertness, and her lips twist into an apprehensive grimace. She whines uneasily, eyes flicking back towards her plants.

Lapis stops, because she's being an attentive friend. Also this is clearly stressful to Peridot. And maybe if she just waits a minute, Peridot will see that nothing bad is happening. The plants are still within eyesight, and they haven't even left.

She'll even give her hand an encouraging squeeze.

Her tail flicks back and forth, the barbs scraping along the floor lightly. She squeezes Lapis's hand as well, exhaling with a huff. Then she charges forward with determined strides, pulling Lapis along, and wrenches the door open herself.

Being yanked along by someone stronger than her? Not really a new thing, honestly. Being yanked along by Peridot? Absolutely a new thing, and she almost trips a little bit due to their differences in height but manages to catch her footing before falling flat.

And helpfully finishes the job Peridot started, pushing her past the boundaries of the door frame and into the hallway, and gives her an expectant look.

"See? Nothing exploded."

Peridot and exhales, conceding with a subdued nod. "I mean I didn't think they were going to explode," she says huffily, crossing her arms.

All the same, she really wants to go back to her room.

"And no one has stolen them either." She tacks on in response to Peridot's huffy tone. "Just like I said."

"I feel like you're willfully disregarding what I explained earlier about something happening to the plants being a symptom of a much bigger problem," Peridot sniffs, though without much bite.

"Absolutely." There it is, Peridot. Your confirmation.

Mostly because she can deal with this problem step by step rather than the Entire Problem of a Gem Dragon. Which is still cool, but obviously Peridot has reservations about it.