I watched as Peridot spiraled into a bundle of conflicting emotions from behind that floating screen. A sliver of amusement crossed my mind as I saw the green Gem experience a sort of cognitive collapse through the robonoid's interface.
Taking advantage of the established link, I probed her mind with a tiny, subtle psychic touch across space, soothing her agitated systems so that her logic would begin to process what had happened as a simple, inevitable sensor malfunction within this facility.
After all, the stress accumulated from the extreme importance of her mission, combined with the antiquity of the Kindergarten's technology, was a perfect excuse for her logical mind to justify that disturbing hallucination. Even more so when, within her rigid, classist society, you could be categorized as defective for simply entertaining such an idea: a human projecting himself larger than the Diamonds themselves, as immense as a solar flare compared to the faint light of a hand-held flashlight.
Who in their right mind would believe that?
I almost laughed at the thought as I waited patiently for Peridot to fully recover from her cognitive lapse.
The funny thing was that even I didn't fully understand what had just happened.
That entire display of mysticism and drama Peridot perceived in me wasn't something I had done explicitly. Lately, my powers had begun leaking into physical reality on their own. Or, to be more precise, a rather weak external source of power was settling over my existence, and local reality ended up shaping it according to the preconceived ideas of the minds inhabiting it.
In other words, a mere matter of perception was forcing me into some kind of conceptual mold foreign to my own definition of myself.
Which was a bit concerning.
When Peridot finally regained her composure, she stared at me for half a second with an intensity that almost made me wonder if I owed her money.
"Ugh, it seems there is a human infestation in the Kindergarten."
She typed hurriedly on the holographic datapad formed by four of her extended fingers. The green-light language she projected was something I didn't bother trying to decipher.
"Infestation is going to be a massive understatement once you meet me in person," I replied, slouching my back slightly and pressing my palms together in an exaggerated gesture worthy of the stereotype of a money-obsessed Middle Eastern merchant.
...
While she kept talking, my thoughts drifted back to the real problem.
I wasn't supposed to be drawing faith or psychic power from anywhere outside my own soul.
Connie still believed I was some kind of supernatural deity, along with a few other acquaintances, but the devotion of a handful of individuals shouldn't be capable of generating these effects. Given the abysmal difference between my own conceptual weight and theirs, it would take several hundred thousand for that to happen, not to mention me actively utilizing that energy source.
Fortunately for me, the current conceptual pressure was so minimal that I would have overlooked it had it not come from an external source, and it only enhanced my existence to a fairly low degree.
To others, my presence felt like a force of the cosmos.
But it didn't go much further than that.
Even so, I needed to find the exact cause before this became a real problem.
Or learn to reject the damn thing.
I had absolutely no intention of giving up my freedom as an individual entity only to end up representing the archetype of a broken god, like what happened to the Emperor of Mankind, or an inconsistent, conceptually enslaved deity like the Ruinous Powers.
I swept those ideas aside for later.
Ultimately, that entire analysis had occurred in just a fraction of a second before continuing.
In response to my performance, the green Gem merely arched an eyebrow. One of her eyes twitched involuntarily, revealing a highly visible disgust in her features. Perhaps it was due to the accumulated frustration from her mission's setbacks, or maybe it was an allergic reaction to the strange memetic interactions I was deliberately exhibiting. I don't know, and honestly, that wasn't the point of the conversation.
The floating screens retreated slightly. The giant green crystal hands Peridot used as controllers mirrored her physical gestures exactly as she spoke to me with absolute condescension, overflowing with deep contempt for a lifeform foreign to her own. Racism? No, technically it was speciesism. Whatever, it didn't matter.
"And how many more humans are present in the area?" she asked, shifting her attention to her main monitor and dismissing my presence after overcoming her initial confusion.
"I have no idea. I think about seven billion across the planet," I replied casually.
Just like her, I decided to mentally disconnect from the conversation. Taking advantage of the fact that her gaze was fixed on the readings, I discreetly raised a hand to signal the Crystal Gems, who still remained hidden beneath the slope of the inverted pyramid.
I deliberately ignored the deeply worried look Nora was throwing my way from her hiding spot. To be honest, I should stop ignoring her reactions for my own good and for the good of the people who depend on me at some point in their lives; but not right now. At this very moment, I needed to stretch this farce a bit longer, for the sake of humanity and all that heroic talk. Damn, sometimes I sound like a total hypocrite trying to justify my own manipulations.
I also decided to ignore the momentary short-circuit my numbers caused in Peridot. I heard her mumble a bit under her breath; I suppose that even with all of Homeworld's state-of-the-art technology, hearing such an absurdly high figure on a planet that was supposed to be devoid of organic life by this stage of colonization was, at the very least, baffling.
The strangest thing of all was that I chose to keep up the charade myself. Talking in cryptic riddles was starting to yield better results than I had originally anticipated, so I couldn't help but keep feeding her paranoia. With so many thoughts and logical threads colliding in my head on a daily basis, I wonder if I've gone mad or if, in reality, I've always been a little unhinged.
"Mmm..." was the only sound that escaped Peridot as I watched her with quiet expectation, anticipating the outcome.
"Then I don't need to ask why you are here. You simply came to finish what they started so long ago," I concluded.
With every word I spoke, Peridot's expression soured noticeably, as if she had swallowed an especially bitter lemon. Just as she opened her mouth, ready to scream and demand an explanation as to how on earth a simple organic possessed that level of classified information, the Gems waiting for my signal acted. They lunged from the shadows toward the control console, pulling hard on one of the main manipulators connected to the screen.
The sudden assault caused Peridot to let out a shriek of sheer panic that echoed through the entire chamber.
"GEMS?!"
And that was the last we heard from her. The solid-light screen shattered into a thousand pieces under the combined strength of Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl, cutting off the broadband transmission for good.
The echo of the destruction still vibrated within the stone walls when I felt a firm pressure on my side. My sweet Nora was standing right next to me, holding my arm with a force so immense that I suspected she could compress raw coal into a diamond. Her eyes silently demanded a coherent explanation for absolutely everything she had just witnessed.
I weighed my options. I thought this would be the ideal moment to drop one of those mystical, cryptic phrases that seem to have a deep meaning but actually say nothing at all; however, relying on that nonsense in front of Nora while she gave me that "explain yourself right now" look would only bring me trouble. A very long night awaited me, and even more so considering the inquisitive stares the rest of the Crystal Gems were throwing my way.
"Mazel tov?" was all I managed to say, offering her a strained smile as I felt her increase the pressure of her grip on me.
Maybe I shouldn't have used an expression meant to bring good luck. Had it actually worked, it would have been a miracle. Come to think of it, do Jewish people even exist in this timeline?