SUMMARY VERSION: This tells the story of how Peridot first came to Earth with villainous intent, but eventually through the POWER OF FRIENDSHIP learned to appreciate organic life, and also became friends with the Crystal Gems. Basically she was sent to Earth to check on the progress of a gigantic geo-weapon called The Cluster, which was a massive artificial fusion made out of the shattered remains of dead gems that was left to incubate below the Earths' surface. The idea of the geo-weapon was that when the Cluster was ready, it would take it's form like any normal gem would, but... gigantic sized. Big enough to split the Earth into pieces. And so the planet that the gem leaders hated SO MUCH would be destroyed, and they would have a planet sized eldritch horror of a soldier at their disposal. 

Jasper and Lapis are mentioned in passing as Peridot's crewmates. Steven is mentioned as the one who brought Peridot around to not hating Earth so much. The story ends with Peridot learning to appreciate Earth, deciding she doesn't want to destroy it, and insulting her leader Yellow Diamond to her face when YD tries to order her to destroy the Earth anyway. Friendship saves the day, and Peridot learns that space dictators fucking suck and you should never meet your heroes. 

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Once upon a time on a strange and brilliant planet, there lived a peridot. She was a gem of a newer make, created on her home planet at a time when resources were in short supply. Because of these limitations, she and all the other gems of her batch were born quite small, so their superiors provided them with special equipment that would help to improve their stature in life. These peridots all knew that they were special because of this, for why would their leader expend such valuable resources creating them and equipping them with such impressive technology, if they were not sorely needed?

Like all gems, this peridot  in question adored the leader for whom she had been created to serve. This leader's name was Yellow Diamond, and out of all the Great Diamond Authority, there was no Diamond more perfect and logical and intelligent than her. Peridot idolized her, and to prove her devotion she worked hard day in and day out, working at the same kind of facility that she herself had just emerged from in order to keep growing new and more powerful gems that would help to serve the growing empire.

One day, Peridot was selected for a very important assignment, one that was handed down from Yellow Diamond herself. She was ordered to monitor a far away planet known as "Earth", and gather certain data from it. This planet, she was told, was vitally important, for you see wars between gems had raged there thousands of years ago, ruining the world’s viability as a colony to the empire. After the colony's fall, Yellow Diamond in her infinite wisdom turned a great loss into a great gain, and had decided to re-purpose both the planet AND the remains of the gems who had fallen there. The shards of the fallen soldiers were reforged into a massive geo-weapon, an artificial gestalt known as The Cluster. For thousands of years the Cluster had been left to gestate, with the mantle of the planet Earth serving as it’s incubator. Peridot’s task would be to check on the progress of the Cluster, and determine how soon it would emerge.

Well. It was only right that Yellow Diamond would set her best kindergartner to check on a growing gem of such a massive scale! Confident in her abilities, Peridot immediately went to work. She started to use all sorts of clever technology to try and complete her task, sending incredible machines across the cosmos to the colony in her stead while she watched their progress from the comfort of her home planet. But it wasn't too long before she began to run into trouble. The machines she was sending kept failing to complete their missions. They would turn up broken, or fail to report back in altogether. Each time this happened, Peridot became more and more frustrated.

"Someone keeps breaking my things!" she complained when questioned by her supervisors about her unusually slow progress. But they were not swayed by her excuses. It was decided that if she could not achieve her goals from a distance, Peridot would just have to travel to Earth and complete the work herself. And so she was sent on a journey across galaxies. Her companions for the trip included a grouchy but powerful jasper-- assigned to Peridot as her escort-- and a somber Lapis Lazuli who had recently returned from Earth, and would serve as her informant.

Alas, this mission would end in disaster. Not long after arriving, Peridot and her crew were set upon by a group of vicious rebel gems who had somehow survived the years since the war, lead by a mysterious earth creature known as The Steven. These rebels destroyed Peridot’s ship, stranding her alone on a hostile alien planet and separating her from her escort and her informant both! The little gem was terrified; the strange and savage planet was full of all sorts of unusual sights, and it was teeming with unfamiliar organic life the likes of which she had never seen. What was worse, the rebels were now hunting her, desperate to put an end to the mission she was so determined to complete. Using her incredible intellect, she successfully evaded them for some time, and even eventually succeeded in collecting the data she was sent to retrieve! There was just one problem now: She need to find her way off of this doomed planet!

For weeks she searched for a way off the gems-forsaken planet, but found little success. Then, just when she thought her situation could not possibly become any more dire... the rebels finally succeeded in capturing her! They cornered her, and the largest of their group set upon her, crushing her body between massive fists, destroying her physical form and imprisoning her gem in a stasis bubble. There Peridot may very well have remained until the day the Cluster emerged and destroyed them all, had it not been for the surprising actions of the Steven. He took pity on the captured gem and freed her from her bubble prison.

From the moment of that act of kindness, things began to change for the peridot in the most unexpected ways. While she still wished to serve her Diamond and complete her mission, she also did NOT wish to perish with this planet she hated so much. So a truce was formed between herself and the rebels, and together they vowed to destroy the Cluster and save the world. They decided they would work together to create an incredible drill that would let them access the Cluster where it lay below the Earth’s crust, and they would use that same drill to destroy it.

At first, Peridot was only motivated by self-preservation. What’s more, she did not like or trust ANY of these rebels (other than the Steven), and she particularly found their customs to be infuriating and confusing. For example, these gems did not work all day, and none of them seemed to want to perform the tasks that they were obviously created to do.They had no respect for proper hierarchy either, and they constantly let their feelings cloud their judgement. Peridot could not wait for this alliance to run it's course, so that she could finally leave and be rid of the lot of them and their bizarre rituals.

However… Over time, her feelings began to change. Suspicion gave way to curiosity, and curiosity gave way to fascination. This planet that she once abhorred so much was starting to become, in her eyes, the most incredibly complex puzzle she’d never contemplated. Every single day she would learn something new and exciting about the Earth, about the lifeforms that called it home… or about the rebels, her enemies-turned-allies who were now slowly becoming her friends. Peridot began to see the beauty within the ever changing chaos of the Earth, the potential it held and the unique resources it could provide. She was even beginning to enjoy her life there, and the freedom it provided her, until she realized: She no longer wished to see this place destroyed!

But her confidence in their plan to stop the Cluster was waning. The more she thought about it, the more ludicrous it seemed to her that the five of them could stop such a monstrosity. So Peridot began to devise an alternative plan, one which she kept secret from her new friends. She retrieved a method of contacting her leader and decided to talk to her about the situation, because if anyone could stop the Cluster, surely Yellow Diamond could. Peridot was certain that she could convinced Yellow Diamond to abort the development of the geo-weapon, if she could just convince her of the value of the resources there on Earth.

But this was not the case. Instead of considering Peridot’s excellent ideas, Yellow Diamond grew enraged that she had dared to even contact her directly. She scoffed at the notion that someone so unimportant could have any ideas worth hearing out, and she berated Peridot, calling her puny and worthless, ORDERING her to complete her mission. Devastated, Peridot began to falter. None of what she was hearing reflected the image of the leader she had come to imagine Yellow Diamond to be! Where she had expected to find logic and objectivity, there was only fury and selfishness. Disillusioned, the little gem came to an abrupt decision. Holding her ground and standing as tall as her short stature would let her, she took a deep breath... and then she LOUDLY rejected Yellow Diamond’s orders, announcing that she would NOT assist in destroying the Earth no matter WHO told her to do it!

Furious, Yellow Diamond snarled: “What do you know about Earth?!” she demanded of the insubordinate gem.

Outraged, Peridot took a deep breath and replied with all the vitriol she could muster: “Apparently more than YOU, you CLOD!” she screamed, insulting the Diamond to her face before hastily ending the call.

As she deactivated the communicator, Peridot’s new friends swarmed around her, embracing her and cheering her for actions, but in her heart Peridot was still very much in shock that she had managed to speak in such a crass manner to her own Diamond. Now there was absolutely no way that she could ever show her face on Homeworld again! She would be branded a rebel for life because of this! But, while she may have lost the respect of her leader, Peridot had gained something much more valuable in the process: A family.

And so, though the Cluster was still lurking out there somewhere, Peridot was no longer so worried about their chances of defeating it. She was more than certain now that together with her friends, they could deal with it quite handily. And so they would!

But that adventure, dear readers, is a story for another day...

It’s around noon when Peridot performs the summoning. By all traditional, dramatic accounts, this might seem an unorthodox time of day to be cracking the barrier between realms and calling upon the infernal forces of hell itself, but, hey. She’s only human, after all; she has a job, a schedule to keep, a sleep pattern to maintain…

Frankly, if you ask her? Anyone who risks doing their demon summoning in the middle of the night while exhausted, just because of tradition or for the ambience or whatever, is probably a clod who deserves to get devoured by an incubus.

No. Peridot is much more pragmatic than that. That’s why she’d woken up this morning after a solid night’s sleep and decided that today, at last, would be the day to act. She’d had herself a sandwich, changed into her work clothes, made sure to hydrate properly AND gone to the bathroom AT LEAST three times before she had gotten settled in to start with her preparations, gleefully determined to put her plan into motion.
Soon enough, the pentagrams had been drawn out, the lines double and then triple checked for accuracy. Incense and candles were both lit, ceremonial items and offerings laid out in the proper arrangements according to all the books. And the whole time that she’s working, in spite of the preciseness of her measurements and the thoroughness of her research, Peridot is achingly aware of the riskiness of this endeavor she’s about to undertake. She’s confident in her theories, and in her own abilities as a summoner, but…

A double summoning. It’s a concept often muttered about among all the scientists at the extradimensional research department which Peridot is employed at, but it’s rarely ever attempted. Too risky, everyone always says. Too many variables, the spells too wordy and complex and the demons… to unpredictable. Managing just one is a struggle for many of those who delve into the dark arts.
But not for Peridot. What can she say, she’s always looking to push the limits of her field, and pulling off such an allegedly impossible feat seems like the biggest and most impressive limit to break of them all.

And all that ambition has led her, at last, to this point. Everything is ready. She seats herself across from the pentagrams, spell book laid open on the floor in front of her, a sticky note with the names of the demons she has selected for this experiment stuck to the edge of the relevant page. She’s practically shaking with excitement, has to take a breath to center herself, focus on the moment before she starts to read aloud.

Ancient words from a lengthy passage. Peridot pronounces every one of them clearly and accurately, and then calls forth through the void for them: Jasper and Lapis Lazuli.
She sits quiet, stock still, and waits for the response.