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Catra knows what it means when she gets the sword before giving chase.
Adora looks worse than she expected, barely conscious. Her princess friend is half dragging and half just holding her upright, moving far too slowly, and Catra is about to tell them to go right and down the elevator, where the Horde's left things so completely undefended even they can make it through, when Adora straightens up a bit and blinks woozily, whatever Shadow Weaver tried to do finally wearing off.
Adora looks at Catra. Then she looks over at the princess at her side and screams, shoving herself free and throwing herself toward Catra. She grabs onto Catra's side and manages a hysterical, "Prin- prin- princess!" her other arm reaching for her hip where her weapon should have been.
"Adora!" the princess calls, holding out a hand, and Adora staggers backward, pulling Catra with her.
Catra chucks the sword at the princess' feet, grabs Adora by the wrist, and runs the other way.
There's a sudden pull from Adora behind her and Catra staggers and turns, expecting Adora to have figured out what's happening and started fighting to get free. Instead she finds Adora's fallen to her knees on the ground. "Th-" Adora says, and then she vomits all over the hallway floor.
Catra waits. Adora just stays on the floor with her head hanging. "Hey, Adora. You in there?"
Adora turns to look up at her. She stares, and stares, and then she closes her eyes and topples over.
There's no thanks for bringing her back. "What did you do?" Shadow Weaver demands instead, as if it's Catra's fault she's had to pile Adora on her back and lug her the entire way.
"I recaptured your prisoner," Catra hisses back. "You're the one who screwed up the spell and broke her brain." She can feel a familiar chill as shadows crawl up her side, but if Shadow Weaver does anything it'd risk her precious Adora getting dropped.
"Put her on the bed," Shadow Weaver orders, and Catra rolls Adora into the bunk. Shadow Weaver puts her hands to Adora's head. There's the red crackle of her magic and Adora mumbles a little but doesn't open her eyes.
"And you always thought I'd be the one to ruin her," Catra says behind them. "Guess your magic isn't worth-"
"She is not. Ruined!" Magic wraps, cold and stinging, around Catra, then fades away with unusual speed. Shadow Weaver turns back to Adora and continues to do whatever it is she thinks she's doing.
Catra waits.
"She needs time to recover," Shadow Weaver says finally, pulling back. It's not clear if she's speaking to Catra or trying to convince herself. "The next time she wakes, her mind will be in order again."
It turns out this is yet another thing Shadow Weaver is wrong about. The next time Adora wakes, due to some other princess trying to drag her into the vents, she's still a babbling, probably brain-damaged mess.
Catra tells Scorpia to guard their prisoner and then considers the situation. Adora's face is bloodless and she's breathing like she's run for hours. "Hey," Catra says. "Hey. Adora?"
"There - she was -" Adora says. "A princess! I - here -"
Lonnie snaps, "Yeah, you sure brought her here." She points a finger in Adora's face. Catra resents how easily she can be angry. "How many of them are there?" Lonnie continues. "How many more of them are going to pop out at us when we're sleeping?"
"More?" Adora squeaks.
"How many!" Lonnie yells back.
Catra has no idea what Shadow Weaver did or how it's supposed to work. Can Adora remember if someone tells her what really happened, or is it gone forever?
"Forget it," Catra tells Adora, pulling her to her feet. She stays upright, at least. "C'mon, follow me."
She leaves Adora in her room. "You'll feel better when you wake up," she tells her, locks the door, and goes to interrogate the princess.
Adora's still asleep when Catra gets back. She flops down across the foot of the bed. The princess, Entrapta, cried about how she didn't understand why Adora didn't want to come back with her, said they were friends.
She hadn't wanted to believe it when Catra said Adora always hated princesses, that she must have just been pretending otherwise before. But she had believed it, especially when Scorpia backed Catra up, said just about everybody here hated princesses, even when they were on the same side. Then Entrapta said that she had other princess friends, and Catra pointed out that she didn't have that either, because all the other princesses had left.
Entrapta hadn't asked about Adora or anyone after that. She'd cried a little more but then she'd stopped, and since then she'd only talked about robots and theories. For all she's a foolish little crybaby, she knows better than to chase after people who left her behind or or seek approval from someone who'll only ever hurt her. To have that kind of strength...maybe that's what's really so dangerous about princesses.
Catra closes her eyes.
"Catra!"
"Wha-"
Adora is staring down at her, looking...Catra would have said terrified before all this, would have made fun of her for getting so riled up, but now she's seen what that really looks like. Adora only looks stressed. "Catra! What's going on, why am I here, why are we here, whose room is this, this is the worst prank, how did you get me here, we're going to get in trouble, Shadow Weaver will be so mad! Catra?! Catra why are you laughing someone will hear this isn't funny!"
It isn't. But if Catra only laughed when things were funny, she wouldn't get to laugh much.
"What's the last thing you remember?" Catra asks, sitting up and staring at her.
"Not agreeing to do this!" Adora shouts, waving her arms about. "What is there to remember? We're cadets! Nothing ever happens! We just did another training mission, like every single day!"
"And then what?"
"Then I went to bed! In the barracks! Where we're both supposed to be!"
"You got possessed," Catra tells her.
"I...I what?"
"You went into the Whispering Forest, and you ran into princesses, and they put a princess called She-Ra in you."
Adora's mouth is hanging open.
"You've been wrecking everything the Horde does ever since."
"I - I'd never do that!"
"Well, She-Ra did. Then Shadow Weaver undid whatever they did to you. She said it'd mess up your memory a little, getting that out of your head."
Adora whispers, "How long was it?"
"...A while. A lot of stuff has happened." Catra falls back down, grins. "I got promoted."
"You're a force captain now?" Adora is grinning back, having not put the pieces together.
"Well, Shadow Weaver couldn't promote you after you declared war on us. She tried, though!" Catra laughs. "She didn't want to admit she'd been wrong. But Lord Hordak wasn't having it. So now I'm Force Captain Catra." Catra taps the force captain badge on her chest. "Check it out. Nice, huh?"
Catra watches her. She doesn't know what Adora will do. Will she swallow down her hurt and pretend she's only happy for Catra, like Catra always did? Or will Adora reach out and tear her badge from Catra's shirt, find Scorpia and Entrapta to follow at her heels, take all the things that were always and only meant for Adora?
Torn between these two, Catra is taken off-guard when instead Adora just starts stammering, "I failed. I really... I failed everyone, I - I let some princess take over my brain and - and -"
"But you're fixed again," Catra tells her. "I mean, Lord Hordak is still totally pissed. It's a shame you didn't wake up earlier, because he got so mad at Shadow Weaver, seriously, it was the best day of my life, see, he'd told her to stop wasting resources on getting you back and then she floated in and was all, 'Good news I, the great Shadow Weaver, totally lost the rebel hostage we had, the one that was critical to your plan and would've ended the rebellion forever, because I was distracted trying to get a different runaway rebel back, and I totally fixed her but also knocked her out and all she can do is sleep-drool on her sheets right now, so that's useful!' and he was all, 'How dare you disobey me! I am even scarier than you!' and then she was all, 'Ah! Pain!' She crawled out of there. Literally!" Catra cackles.
Catra pauses. Adora usually chides her about being disrespectful at this point, but she's silent.
"Not that he'll kick you out or anything," Catra says quickly. "Now that you are back, you, for real. You probably won't even get punished at all. I mean Shadow Weaver would never, and I'll tell him not to too. I'll tell him it's you now, and that you'd never sabotage us or run away or smash up everything, and it's not your fault the other princess got away, that's all Shadow Weaver's fault. I'll tell him! It'll be fine! It was She-Ra who caused all the trouble."
"But it's my fault she could do it," Adora whispers. "If I hadn't been so weak, or so stupid, or if I hadn't disobeyed and gone out against the rules, I wouldn't have gotten taken over. I wouldn't have fought against - and." She cuts off, her eyes going wider and wider. "And if you're a force captain now, then I...then that means you...and it's when I wasn't even here that you finally became a force captain! Shadow Weaver was right!"
Catra goes rigid. "Right about what?"
"It's because I wasn't a good leader you were always getting in trouble!" She lunges across the bed and wraps her arms around Catra. She presses her face into Catra and Catra can feel the tears seeping into her fur. "I didn't mean to! I tried! I tried but nothing ever worked and, and now it turns out I was worse than not even being here, I was even worse trying to help you than being an evil princess trying to kill you, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry..."
The real best day of Catra's life had been when they were young, when Catra was hurt and scared and crying and Adora sat beside her and said she'd be there for her, that at least she had Adora and that'd be enough, and as it slipped away further each day all Catra had dared to want was to keep hold of it.
Now it's Adora sobbing at her side, now Catra has friends and success and safety and Adora has only Catra. Adora doesn't know that outside is a whole world of people and that she loves every one of them more than Catra, and she doesn't know everyone would love her back. And Catra knows now, knows exactly what it is that keeps anyone by her side and that all she has to do to keep that is keep everyone better away. Even if Catra casts no more light than a candle, if you never see the sun you'd think even a candleflame is bright.
Adora sobs and sobs. "I failed you."
"Yeah," Catra says. "But I forgive you, Adora."