Chapter Text
It's not exactly a surprise when Adora wakes to find no sign of Catra - Catra's always the very first or very last one awake, that's just how it is - but it's still disconcerting. And unlike back home Adora has no idea where to look for her.
"Please don't make trouble," she mutters.
She walks in a circle around the bed, staring at the various things Glimmer pointed to before. The weird shaped thing with bubbles has a lot of weird smells to it. She works up the courage to poke the very top and one bursts, leaving a soapy residue on her fingers. So, that's probably soap. Maybe the showers are somewhere else and people bring the bubbles from their rooms.
She's startled by a sound that seems like it must be from someone banging from outside, only very lightly. Adora scurries over and opens the door.
"Hi!" Glimmer chirps. She leans to the side to look around Adora. "Oh, you guys had a pillow fight?"
Now she knows what they're for! This is a good start to the day. "Uh, yes. Yes, that thing."
"So, our weekly meeting with the rebellion generals is today, and you're invited!"
"Oh." More people who'll - no, more people she'll have the chance to impress.
Glimmer continues to peer around Adora. "Where's Catra?"
"She got up early," Adora says, then realizes this does not impress people who think you're a spy and continues almost smoothly, "To look for more mice! But I'm sure she'll get to the meeting on time!"
Glimmer just looks confused. "How…?"
"I'm sure she will!"
"But she doesn't know there's a meeting."
Adora bites back a whimper. No, Catra doesn't. This isn't like back home where everyone always knew what they were supposed to be doing and where they were supposed to be. Now Catra's going to get in trouble for being late when it's not her fault for once and it's all because Adora was too much of a coward to talk to Glimmer last night and find this out. "Right. So - so she might be late, because she doesn't know."
Glimmer sighs. "It probably doesn't matter that much. It's not like Mom's going to agree to let us actually do anything. She never does."
("Do not disappoint her.")
"But that was before She-Ra appeared!" Adora says. "Your mom said that it was She-Ra's job to bring balance to Etheria."
"Yeah, you're right!" Glimmer bangs a fist against her hand. "And if She-Ra appears when she's needed the most, then if she's here then that means we've got to get moving! " Glimmer grins. "Come on, let's get going to breakfast."
And breakfast is delicious. Glimmer gets a platter heaped with mysterious things and they sit by a window.
Adora hollows out the airy innards of one of the 'bread' balls and begins stuffing 'eggs' and whatever the heavy green and yellow slices were inside whenever Glimmer looks away. Catra might actually be catching mice. She also might not be. And Catra always insisted the grey ration bars were the best even though everyone knew the brown ones were because they were sweet. The only thing the grey ones had in their favor was that they were squishy and smooth and somehow moist-tasting even though they had no water in them.
She successfully transfers the ball to the inner pocket of her jacket and reaches for more. Glimmer observes that she must like 'avocado'.
"Yes," Adora agrees, and crams the slice she has into her mouth. And she does like it, even if it's not as good as the solid green sweet ones or the orange sweeter ones or the extremely sweet and crunchy white ones with a red crust. Glimmer continues to not pay very much attention to Adora fussing with the food and she successfully fills another two 'bread' and gets them into her pockets without suspicion.
"The meeting will be starting soon," Glimmer warns, and Adora quickly shovels everything left on the plate into her mouth. "Don't choke!"
Adora gulps. "I won't."
She does. She absolutely does. The room is so beautiful and bright and the walls are covered in drawings of people and Adora is too awestruck to think about what she's doing. She tries to sit down next to Bow and she takes King Micah's chair like the Horde took King Micah himself and...
She wishes the queen had just done something right then. Waiting is the worst part.
"And where is Catra," the queen says.
"I didn't tell her, I'm sorry!"
"She's nuts about squirrels, Mom," Glimmer says. "She hasn't even come back for a real breakfast."
"But she will be back!"
The queen says, "Very well then," in a way that doesn't sound like it's actually well.
"Nuts for squirrels," Bow whispers, sounding amused. "Good one, Glimmer."
It turns out Adora was wrong when she told Glimmer that things would be different now that She-Ra was here because Glimmer barely gets a word out before her mother shoots down the idea of actually fighting the Horde.
And maybe it's because Adora's there, or because Adora failed to bring Catra and everyone still thinks they're spies, or because Adora has just messed up yet again, but when Glimmer protests her mother yells at her and her wings go out like the darkness around Shadow Weaver.
Adora has to fix this. And prove herself useful. And save Etheria before it's too late. And let Glimmer do something so she doesn't disobey her mom again. Even if it's scary when people get so mad, she shouldn't be a coward. She raises her hand and says, "You should send me, Catra, Glimmer and Bow on the relief mission. You can send me as She-Ra. I'll make sure that everyone gets there safely and protect them if the Horde attacks. I promise. I won't disappoint you."
The queen still looks frightening but this doesn't appear to have made her any more angry. She sighs once and then glowers at Adora. "Very well. You will deliver food and supplies to Plumeria and under no circumstances will you engage the Horde. You'll leave at dawn."
Adora smiles in relief, and Bow and Glimmer are smiling at her, and everything is going fine again.
The queen leaves and the others nod to Glimmer and leave as well. Now all Adora has to worry about is finding Catra before Catra causes any more trouble.
"Hey, Adora," says Catra, poking her head out from under the table.
"Catra!" Adora shouts. "WHY!"
"I mean, why not?" Catra says, standing upright and then leaning back against the table she'd been hiding under.
"I - I -" Adora sputters, and then angrily gestures at Glimmer and Bow while raising her eyebrows because she can't just say out loud that she's been stuck covering for Catra in front of the people she was covering it up to. Catra rolls her eyes back and does a dismissive not-like-I-asked-you-to handwave. Adora stomps her foot.
"I'm more confused about how…" Bow says. "I thought no one told you."
Catra points to her head and wiggles her ears. "Good hearing. There's a lot no one tells me."
Adora smacks herself in the face. Catra was outside their room. Of course she'd be there. She didn't know anything about the palace either and even Catra wasn't foolhardy enough to run around someplace she didn't know. All Adora'd needed to do to find her was stick her head out the window. "You could have just followed me…" she groans through her hand.
"Aw, but you should've seen your face!" Catra climbs to the top of Glimmer's chair. From atop her perch, she continues, "Besides, I'm not a princess. Is this really all the princesses there are? A couple seats around a table?"
"Well, even back when the princess alliance was running," Glimmer says, "not all the princesses joined. There's even a princess with the Horde."
"No there isn't," Adora says immediately. "Princesses are - are the Horde's enemy."
"Not all of them," Glimmer says, bitterness in her voice. "The place where the Horde started used to be a princess' kingdom. After the Horde landed there, they joined forces. Apparently they were always kind of bad news."
Catra, though, looks like she's suddenly realized something. "You have to recharge. Out of that rock outside, right? The glowy one? That's a princess thing, magic powers from magic rocks that runs out?"
"Yeah," says Glimmer.
But that can't be right.
Catra nods to herself. "So, was that pretty much how these are? Princess says go, Queen says no?"
Glimmer sighs and looks down. "Pretty much, yeah." There's a miserable roughness to the words.
Catra hops down again. "Well. That's not too bad, then. If you were losing all the time and actually trying, that'd be way worse than losing because you're not, right?"
"And...maybe if this goes well, I'll get the chance to do more," Glimmer says. "Maybe Mom will rethink things."
Adora and Catra share a look. No. No, she will not.
"And we have time to get you guys new clothing!" Bow adds.
Catra jumps onto the table, then to the top of the queen's chair, the highest point in the room. "No! The cloak was the worst part of yesterday!"
"Don't be so dramatic. It was only the second worst thing," Adora says.
Bow holds up his hands placatingly. "It doesn't have to involve any cloaks."
And they have to stop dressing as Horde cadets if they're not with the Horde. Adora grits her teeth and says, "I think that sounds great. Why don't I go first."
"It'll be fun," Glimmer says, grinning. "Follow me." She and Bow lead the way out of the room. Adora follows, pulling one of the balls of food out of her pocket and holding it behind her. A moment later, it's snatched up.
"Show up for breakfast next time," Adora whispers, passing her the next two.
"I'll think about it."
The joke turns out to be on Catra, because the new clothes aren't particularly awful, just different. Glimmer evidently only wears loose, icky-feeling clothing but Bow understands the idea of shirts and pants that actually fit. In fact, she can just get copies of her current clothing.
See? New things are fine. And she's sure going to a new kingdom and meeting new people will go fine too.
And for the first minute or two of the mission, it is. She's She-Ra, not Evil Horde Soldier Adora, and as soon as she's seen everyone clusters around her with enormous smiles.
"Look!" says the one in the middle. "The universe has heard our pleas and sent the legendary She-Ra to help us save our home."
And suddenly everyone is no longer clustered so much as attached to her. Somehow a small child has wrapped itself around one arm and another person hugs her around the waist. "Uh? Glimmer? What's happening?" She looks desperately at Glimmer and Bow for what to do next but they're just smiling, and then Catra in the cart, who is rolling back and forth shaking with silent laughter at her discomfort.
Great. Sure. She'll just handle this herself.
She follows the one saying she'll show She-Ra around. The person tells her about how the land is full of flowers and also trees, and then stops at a large tree that gives her powers, so, she's another princess, the princess Perfuma who sent the message. That must be why plants kept appearing out of nowhere. And according to Bow and Glimmer, all the other plants around are apparently dead, and this is bad, and the princess doesn't know what to do about it and also doesn't want to talk about it.
How can you tell if a plant is dead? They're plants. She's pretty sure a plant doesn't do anything beyond exist in a spot. But She-Ra can't not know when something's wrong. And it sounds like this is something completely obvious, because the princess doesn't seem surprised when Bow and Glimmer say they noticed.
Catra, not a princess, is willing to open her mouth and ask, "What exactly do you expect her to do, then?"
"Oh, I didn't see you there!" the princess says, as if Catra hadn't been deliberately skulking in the back, and drops flowers on Catra's head. Catra makes a distressed growl. "Wonderful! And the celebration's about to begin!"
That turns out to involve food. "No no no," she says, holding up her hands. "You need this food more than we do."
Catra grabs one of the round green things in the bowl She-Ra's trying to refuse and then hops into the tree faster than She-Ra can grab her. She bites into it and liquid dribbles down her chin. "It's chewable water. Nice!"
"Catra," she groans.
"You can't keep everyone from making bad decisions," Catra retorts, and takes another bite. Around it, she mutters, "We brought food, they're wasting food and time feeding us now, we tried, might as well eat."
"We are so honored to have you here!" interjects the princess, flopping down by She-Ra's leg.
"Maybe you should try other feelings," Catra tells her. "Like fear." She points toward the smoke that She-Ra's eyes keep drifting toward. "Staring at her instead of that isn't going to make it disappear."
"This is the She-Ra!" Perfuma says with greater emphasis. "The universe sent her here to fix things! Returned after all these centuries in our hour of greatest need, just like in the stories!"
"What stories?" She-Ra blurts out.
Well, apparently She-Ra tames beasts by saying a magic word. And apparently Bow thinks that story is too reasonable because now he's telling increasingly impossible ones.
"None of those sound like, 'And then pretending the Horde wasn't right outside made them all die instead of us!' so I don't see why it matters!" Catra calls down.
"Catra!" shouts Glimmer. "That's not helping!"
"You'd know!" Catra snaps back.
"Of course we don't expect She-Ra to do that!" The princess' eyes gain a shine like she's near tears. She takes a breath, then clasps her hands together and regains her smile. "We're just so excited for you to heal our land and bring all the plants back to life. Will you be doing it before the drum circle, or after?"
"You want me to, uh, you want me to heal your land?" she repeats.
"Yes! Like in the ancient story, She-Ra Heals the Forest and Brings the Trees Back to Life."
Catra drops out of the branch and grabs She-Ra's sword. "Lady. Do you not know what this is."
"It's the sword of She-Ra!"
"It's a pointy thing to hit things with," Catra says. "That's how swords work. Sometimes, it also glows and puts pointy things on horses, which I assume they use to hit more things. The only thing a weapon fixes is a problem still being alive."
"Wait, Horsey-" Bow starts to say.
"Except this is a magic sword," Glimmer interjects. "I'm sure She-Ra can use it to solve whatever's wrong here."
"What's wrong here is the Horde!" Catra screams. "Are you blind?" Then she spins from Glimmer and grabs the shoulder of Perfuma, waving at the rising smoke. "You can see it from here! So eat the food she brought and then go use your princess powers to blow up the Horde instead of sitting around!"
"Knock it off, Catra!" Glimmer demands.
And this place's princess… "I…" How she sags. Just the sight hurts. She cups her hands and holds them out to Catra. A brilliant red flower appears. "This is my power. I grow plants."
The flower turns brown and curls up.
"We're not...strong enough to go up against the Horde."
"I didn't realize there were useless princesses," Catra says. Adora hadn't known that either.
Bow gasps. "Catra! That's uncalled-for."
Catra ignores him and says to Perfuma, "Fine. She-Ra's here and she's a regular useful princess. She'll blow them up for you."
"Really, all we want is for our plants to be healed," the princess insists.
"And then what?"
"We'll continue to live here peacefully, in our ancestral lands." The princess smiles winningly at Catra.
Catra scoffs in return. "With the Horde still there?"
She-Ra tries to speak up. "Catra, I think-"
"No, you don't!" Catra snaps. "Even if you could wave your hand and magic away whatever toxins the Horde's pumping out, and you can't because you'd have done it by now, they'll just keep doing it." She waves her hand across all the people watching She-Ra, all the people who need She-Ra to fix this. "Their plants will be dying again before you even have time to walk out of the place. If another She-Ra saved another forest, she did it by getting rid of the real problem. And what luck! You're actually good at that."
Something booms in the direction of the smoke, and the column itself billows and thickens.
And it's true, she's a lot more confident in her ability to fight than to just hope the magic will do something when she wants, especially after all the difficulty the sword gave Adora with just turning into She-Ra. Even if it's a power She-Ra has, what if Adora's just too stupid to get it to work?
"The Horde...they were making machines to poison plant life, as part of destroying the Whispering Woods," she says slowly. Adora hadn't really understood how that worked beyond that plants were alive and poison made alive things dead. "It wasn't successful there, but… If this started when they showed up, then Catra has a point. Removing the poison that's here now won't stop them from putting more poison into your kingdom. Your plants would just get sick again."
"But, uh…" Bow says awkwardly. "We're really not here to fight the Horde."
Right. She can't disobey orders.
"We can't just abandon these people!" Glimmer cries.
But she can't let everyone down. Or disappoint Glimmer after she vouched for them.
Okay. Okay. Okay.
She-Ra opens her mouth and says, "We might be able to destroy the machine without fighting the Horde. I think I know enough to let us sneak in." And she smiles as confidently as she can at the assembled people. "Don't worry," She-Ra tells them. "I'll solve this. I promise, I won't let the Horde destroy anything more."
They cheer. "She-Ra! She-Ra!"
"Are you sure about this?" Bow whispers.
She-Ra keeps her smile fixed in place. "Yes," she says through her teeth. "Absolutely."