LOG-027.

  I eventually found my target exiting the hallway that one of my components knew led to the ship's hydroponics bay.

  To say that Brim's reaction to my fantastic appearance was simply sublime would be...well, it would certainly be a bit of an understatement. The Lapis Lazuli visibly paused as I turned the corner, sauntering towards her with a smile stretching my lips.

  "H-wuh?"

  Adorable.

  The blue Gem could do little but freeze, mouth opening and closing as I steadily closed the distance, leaning down and flashing her a grin.

  "Hello Brim! Lovely to finally track you down, and may I just say that it's simply an utter pleasure to make your acquaintance?"

  The silent hesitation turned to half comprehensible babbling, the rock cutter's burgeoning blush steadily beginning to both grow and deepen as I leaned forward, ensuring my breath reached just shy of her ear.

  "But-buhwuh-uh-"

  "You can call me Honey-Lemon Pearl, or just Honey if you'd prefer to be a little more casual. Now as you can see, my dear components took some time to figure out this whole fusion business, and if I'm not acting just a bit too forward...I'd dare say they would both simply love to add you into the mixture as well..."

  "...Eeeeeek!"

  I could practically feel my eyes sparkling at the familiar noise, drawing up one hand to gently plant atop the Lazuli's shoulder.

  "Might I take that as a rather definitive yes?"

  For just a moment, the speed of Brim's rapidly bobbing head worried me, before I reminded myself that the chances of a Gem dislocating something were quite literally zero.

  "Marvelous! Though it feels a little tactless to dance around in the middle of a hallway. Perhap we should retire to the quarters assigned to-"

  Rumble.

  I blinked, my offer cut off as the entire ship seemed to shake.

  The Lapis in front of me startled in turn, glancing around quickly with wide eyes and a worrying tension to her lightform.

  Well, surely it would sort itself out? We had business to-no. Starships didn't just shudder like that. We-I needed to find out what-but we wanted-but-

  The last thing I saw and felt amidst the feeling of disagreement was an utterly blinding flash, bursting over the sudden tangle of thoughts and emotions in my head.

  ---

  "Ugh..."

  My mind remained hazy for just a second as I blinked, a hand going up to rub at my scalp. Then my eyes widened as I glanced around, locking gazes with a still blushing but now visibly concerned Brim.

  "...Huh."

  A turn of my head revealed my...Batchmate. Vermilion was in a similar situation to myself, it seemed. The crimson Pearl looked a little unsteady on her feet, at least until she managed to get her senses about her again.

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  Then she caught sight of me, and her entire face practically lit up like a red fucking lamp.

  I'd be a liar if I said I didn't feel a decent bit of heat going to my own cheeks, though. Unfortunately (or fortunately, I still wasn't sure) the awkward moment didn't get to last very long as another long shake jostled all of us around.

  Barely catching myself on a nearby wall, I reached over, grasping a flailing Vermilion even as I shouted over towards the third person making up our impromptu trio.

  "Brim! Any idea as to what this is!?"

  There was a slight crackle, up until I noticed a large flask seemingly strapped to the blue Gem's waist practically vibrating as its cap steadily screwed off, a long line of what almost looked like pressurized water pouring out from the container and settling into a pair of thin looking wings at the Lazuli's back.

  All the while, she was moving forward, one hand beckoning us to follow her.

  "We were supposed to be meeting up at the rendevouz for the main fleet elements around now! But I somehow doubt we're just passing through an asteroid field or-"

  That's when the normally bright white lights interspersed throughout the hallway abruptly blinked off, swapping to a dim, blinking orange. The change in colour was followed up by a low klaxon beginning to wail throughout the entire damned ship, piercing my ears.

  I shifted slightly, even as I felt Vermilion's hands tugging worriedly at my side. All the while, Brim only grew more worried.

  "Battle stance...? Right, definitely not asteroids! Come on!"

  ---

  The trip to the bridge had been a panicked, rushed affair. Just about every Avian we ran into was either in the middle of effectively battening down the hatches, or hurrying in some other direction. Quick chirps and squawks met Brim's own question, the Lapis Lazuli taking on a slightly despairing look as we made our way into the command center.

  My own pointed stare prompted a wince from the rogue terraformer, even as we passed the somewhat amusing sight of a clearly pissed off Quille practically shoving a bunch of organics out of the bridge and towards one of the other hallways.

  "Some other group got followed, apparently. We've got several distinct masses of Imperial vessels on a direct intercept course for the fleet, and if sensors aren't lying to us then there's at least a few dozen extra drive signatures indicating incoming enemy reinforcements. All the shaking is from us trying to get to the fleet faster than they can."

  My face didn't pale. I had no blood to drain, after all, only light. But my hand definitely clenched maybe just a little too tightly around Vermilion's own as I pulled her along, my mind racing at the implications.

  Even if they were actually rather simple, when one got down to it. Our allies had been found out, and now we were going to have to deal with an entire warfleet dropping in on top of us.

  Shit.

  The next few moments passed in relative inactivity on my end, unfortunately. There simply wasn't much for any of us to do besides stand around and wait for orders as the old bird I was now certain was the captain belted out orders into some kind of speaker, a tense Talon standing beside him, the Citrine's arms crossed yet fingers tapping anxiously at her lightform.

  The holo-table from before painted a rather dangerous picture, to say the absolute very least.

  We were moving in from one direction, alongside several other red tubes that I safely assumed indicated either individual or allied groups of ships. In the middle of the 'map' lay well over a dozen massive rugby ball shaped vessels, alongside at least a hundred or more of the 'war tubes.'

  It was on the opposite end that a series of dark blue shapes were making themselves apparent, moving on a direct, linear course for the main fleet's position.

  Though the symbols were obviously meant to be simplified versions of the actual enemy complement, I could guess their composition well enough from the shapes alone. Several hand ships, at least a dozen destroyers and a pair of cruisers made up the core of the assault fleet, surrounded by a veritable swarm of roaming eyes and robonoid corvettes.

  And that wasn't even taking into account the likely uncountable number of fighter craft.

  It was the massive yellow triangle in the center of the map that several rugby balls were seemingly clamped to that took up my attention though, enough that Talon leaned over a second later, poking at the shape.

  "That's the containment barge one of our science types has been building around the essence."

  The Citrine let out a harsh crooning sound, before blinking and shaking her head.

  "Er...her name would be...Long Sight. Maybe? Not sure how it translates but-agh! Not the time! She's a Peridot, real smart. Came up with the whole plan to use the Essence we stole to fly ourselves out of this damned place."

  The golden Gem's eyes narrowed at the approaching blue shapes indicating the storm of death the Empire was preparing to throw at us, before sighing in slight relief.

  "We'll get there first. Should give the homeships some time to get their fancy new fuel prepared, then we can make the jump and-"

  The elder-captain let out a chirp as something sparked atop the control station he'd (Quille had confirmed the gender a while back, during a brief, slightly awkward meeting outside the cafeteria) been yelling at, right before an unfamiliar voice (but one that very much held the qualities of a Gem rather than an actual organic) began to squawk back at him.

  Talon and I stared at the exchange for a moment, the Citrine listening intently while I did my best to make out what words I could, all the while trying to keep from falling over as a more than nervous Vermilion practically tried to meld into my lightform.

  A second later, and the Quartz Gem was letting loose a slightly feral grin, even as she turned to glance at me.

  "Good news, we don't actually need most of the essence, just enough to send us off. New plan is to load up the homeships and then let the damned Imperials have what they've come here for, along with a little extra."

  A dangerous glint entered her eyes at my obviously questioning look.

  "They'll want their stupid Diamond juice more than anything, so we're gonna fill that barge with as many explosives as we've got. Should give us a nice view right before we jump out of Imperial territory for good, eh?"

  The plan seemed a little haphazard, but didn't have any real vulnerabilities I could point out. Whoever 'Long Sight' was, she was absolutely right. With refined Diamond essence on the line, whoever was commanding this Gem fleet would likely focus on taking the invaluable resource back from the organics who'd stolen it, even above exterminating said organics in the first place.

  I just really hoped the vessel we were on got assigned to escorting the homeships the Hell out of there, rather than taking the fight directly to our enemy to help buy time or something. The absolute last thing I needed at this point was to get blown out into space by a stray fucking energy blast, after all.