fandomhigh | Library, Wednesday

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Library, Wednesday

Peridot took one step into the library today, paused, and then had to dive to avoid being trampled over by a stampede of books all heading her way.

Or, rather, a stampede of books all racing along what appeared to be a makeshift track fashioned out of carefully placed index cards, which Peridot was quite certain she was going to need to sort out and put away herself, since the books seemed intent on just zooming around in circles. They weren't hurting anything, really, just so long as nobody stepped onto their race track, but it was a little bit vexing all the same.

She still wasn't completely certain why Earth's intelligent species insisted on using such an impetuous method of data recording.

[OOC: A purring cat ate the OCD.]

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There was no way Summer could have gotten out of her first class without the insane drive to do something, but she was stuck in that awkward position of not knowing what could be done. She didn't even know where the Galactic prison where her grampa was being held was, but she thought maybe, if there was anywhere to find a seed of information, it could be the library at an interdimensional school filled with aliens and people from different timelines and other weird little randos.

So she stepped in, not sure what to expect, but she definitely wasn't expecting a book Grand Prix that she nearly stepped into but managed to quickly hop back.

"Uhhhhhhh...."

Should she come back at a different time?

"Don't step on the non-fiction!"

Sorry, Summer. You now had a small, green, somewhat triangular alien waving an arm at you from where she was attempting to re-route the racetrack to a slightly less disastrous corner of the room.

"They're sensitive!"

"Sorry, sorry!" Summer flailed her hands a little in a somewhat panicked apology, backing up a little more for extra measure. And then she remembered she was in a library and lowered her voice.

"Sorry! I didn't know."

That books would be running around like zooming little cars, because how the hell would she??

Hey, how Summer did or didn't know something wasn't Peridot's problem, was it? She was just here to... babysit the books, mostly.

She eyed the human for a few moments before nodding her head and easing back a little, apparently mollified.

"Well, now you do," she settled on. "Careful, they're coming around again."

Summer heeded the warning, waited patiently for the latest loop, and then hurried over to safer ground before they had a chance to swing around again.

"Hey, aren't you in my Woodworking class?" she noted when she got a good look at the other...person, because, really, it was hard to forget such a, uh, unique-looking individual. Summer had gotten used to it in a way, with all her grampa's crazy friends, but it was pretty easy to remember green people with triangle heads. "Are you here researching something, too?"

"Researching something? Whenever I possibly can," Peridot replied. "But also, I work here."

She moved a few more index cards, and then nodded and dusted her hands off before looking up at the human.

"And I do believe we are in the same class, yes. We rubbed abrasive pulped tree fiber sheets against wooden surfaces to make them smoother?"

"Sanding," Summer nodded. "That's right. Can't wait to see what other exciting new wood working adventure we get into tomorrow."

She could. She really, really could. Only reason she looked forward to that class was because the teacher was a total nerd.

"But you work here! That's great! Maybe you can help me. I'm trying to find some information, but I really have no idea where to start or even if anything here will be useful."

As the books whizzed by again, her doubts ticked up another notch.

"I'm pretty sure we have books about everything," Peridot said, glancing at the books momentarily before looking back to Summer. "... What did you need?"

The trick wasn't picking a topic that they had books about. The trick, here, was actually locating them in a library that stocked books from sources that spanned the entire multiverse. Especially when they were racing around.

"I need information on an government entity called the Galactic Federation," said Summer, and wouldn't that be a nice not-at-all-vague-and-probably-used-by-millions-of-dimensions topic to search for? "Specifically their laws and penal codes and imprisonment facilities, if possible."

"We... probably have something like that," Peridot hedged, her mind following much the same train of thought as the narrative. "I guess that would be under government... things."

She pursed her lips for a moment in thought, and then shrugged and waved into the stacks.

"Which would be this way, if we have anything at all."

"Hey," Summer said, shrugging as she followed the wave, "it's a start. Thank you."

And, after she got a good look at the shelves themselves. "Uhh, what's the check-out policy here, by the way?" This....could be quite the project.

Peridot looked up at the books as well, squinting a bit. Yeah, there were at least a few realities that had something by that name or similar. This was going to be an endeavor.

"... How quickly do you read?"

Because she could be coerced into assisting, or at the very least renewing any unread books on a regular basis if need be.

"Not very," Summer admitted, drawing in a deep breath to steel herself for the daunting task ahead of her. "I'm not much of a reader..."

Unless we were talking texts on her phone. Too bad no one could just text her the location.

"Well, then the first step," Peridot mused, "is likely going to be figuring out which books don't apply to you. There are enough realities out there that should be fairly obviously not what you're looking for, one might hope."

Space was a big place and reality was even bigger still, but Peridot was still fairly certain that she could fake her way through a stack of books until relevant information presented itself on most topics.

"Well," Summer said thoughtfully, scanning spines and considering them, "if it helps, at least one of the branches of the Galactic Federation I'm dealing with is run by a race of bug creatures, if that helps narrow it down. It seems that these bugs are generally their military force, so any mention of them would narrow it down for sure."

She tentatively pulled a book from the shelf and briefly leafed through it. She wrinkled her nose and put it back shortly thereafter.

"Not what you're looking for?" Peridot considered the shelf for a moment, and then slipped around the corner for a moment, coming back with a stepladder. When you came up to most humans' waists at best, sometimes you needed a little extra boost to get to the stuff on higher shelves. "Let's see if we can find bugs."

A pause.

"By which you mean insect-like creatures, right?"

Look, she was a sentient gemstone. These things needed to be clarified sometimes.

"That's right," said Summer with a nod. "Only they're bigger and bipedal, like us. Big red buggy eyes and feelers on their heads. Usually just a little taller than the average human. Wings. Creepy little pincers. Blech." Summer shuddered. "Not. A. Fan."

That earned a thoughtful tilt of a decidedly triangular head as Peridot scaled the ladder and started pulling out books that looked as though they might be relevant.

"Have they got... I don't know, a logo or something to look for?"

The way the Great Diamond Authority did!

Summer frowned, as it took her a moment to remember, which, really, it shouldn't have, because they'd plastered it everywhere once they took over Earth. Her palm met her forehead. In her defense, her mind was everywhere at the moment. "Oh, yeah, duh! Smart! That would help, wouldn't it? Here, I think I've got my ID badge with it..." She pulled out her wallet, fished around and pulled out the card.

"There! If it's anywhere in here, it'll probably have that logo there." She pointed out the globe with the circle of stars and the weird marking in the center, hoping Peridot didn't notice the part of the ID that listed Summer's age as 42. Dumb new Galactic Federation calendar...

Peridot leaned down as far as she could without falling off the ladder, squinting down at the ID badge and, yes, reading the entire thing as thoroughly as she could from up there.

"You humans are all so new," she muttered, shaking her head, and then climbing up the ladder a little more and looking, first, to see if there were any books that had the corresponding logo on the spine. "I'm going to pass down anything that looks even close, just to be certain. Does that work for you?"

"That sounds fantastic," Summer said, holding up her arms to show she was ready to receive whatever Peridot managed to find. She was blushing just a bit at the 'new' statement, thinking it referred more to her brain capacity than her supposed age, for not thinking of something so simple, and it sparked her to ask, conversationally, as they searched, "So, you're obviously not human, then; can I ask, uh, what....species? you are, then?"

"I'm a Gem," Peridot replied, plucking a few books down from the shelves one after the other and holding them down for Summer to take as she did so. What she wouldn't give for her limb enhancers in situations like this; she'd be able to hold so much more, and wouldn't even need to balance precariously on the ladder in order to manage it. "We're a non-organic race of... sentient minerals, I suppose, would be the easiest way to explain what we are."

She pulled another book from the shelf and looked at it thoughtfully.

"I'm a Peridot. I suppose a human could consider me a... a Gem subspecies, to put it in organic terms."

Summer took the chance to set a few of the ones Peridot had handed down on the floor, freeing up her arms for more if needed. "A whole race of Gems? That's so cool; I've never heard of something like that before."

Which really was saying a lot.

"What would bring a Gem to a place like this?"

She kind of wanted to ask if there were, like, Diamonds and Rubies and Emeralds and all the really pretty ones. Ooh, Opals, Aquamarine, Topaz! But it seemed a little...rude? She didn't know, so she always felt it was better safe and silent than sorry in these instances.

"Initially, science," Peridot replied, casually, because she saw little need to lie given her current situation. "I was sent here by Yellow Diamond to check on an experiment that was left behind thousands of years ago. Unfortunately, there was an... incident... and the ship I arrived on was destroyed beyond repair."

And her escape pod wasn't doing much better.

"So now I'm... stranded. Sort of. I'm not exactly looking for a way to leave, either."

Because she enjoyed being whole and alive, thank you.

"Why not?" Summer asked, finding it interesting that her whole point in being in the library today was to help her get out of here. "Do you like it here?"

"More than I thought I would," Peridot replied, after a brief pause. "More than I should. Earth is so full of... life. It's like nothing else my people have ever known. It's no wonder there are those who are willing to fight for it."

Awwww. That was such a great answer, one that definitely helped bolster Summer's own ambitions, too. That's right, things meant fighting for, and one of those was an Earth with her Grampa Rick, one not ruled by dumb bugs.

"Maybe that's why you like it so much," she mused. "Because it is so different. Now you have me wondering what your home is like, if it's really that different."

"It's... home," Peridot said, turning her attention back to the books on the shelf. That question was a loaded one, whether Summer knew it or not. "It's hard to think that I can't ever go back there. But Earth is... what's the thing you humans say? A decent consolation prize?"

It was also less likely to get her shattered. So. There was that.

And Summer thought she could recognize that tone, that shifting of attention, that hesitation, so she halted the questions. For now.

"Thanks for helping me out, by the way," she said instead. "I really appreciate it."

The gratitude was something else that Peridot was working on wrapping her head around. They weren't exactly big on thanks on Homeworld.

"Well, it is my job," she pointed out, passing another book down toward Summer for good measure. "But I suppose you're welcome, anyway."

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Library, Wednesday

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