Work Text:
Adora has had many sleepless nights the past few weeks, but tonight seemed to be the night where her insomnia insisted on being the winner. Everytime she closed her eyes she saw her, she saw Catra, the look of hurt on her face when Adora had told she was leaving the Horde, and felt the guilt she always felt when hearing her name said by her.
This had been about day three or four of total complete sleeplessness. In the past she got a few good winks, but now her body felt heavy and she couldn’t even quite seem to tell the difference between the waking world and her dreams.
“Hey, Adora.”
Adora's eyes shot open, and she glanced around the room, searching for the source of the sound. She squinted into the darkness, seeing familiar yellow and blue eyes stare back at her.
“Catra? How did you—” Adora’s sentence was cut off by the sound of her sword clattering to the ground. “How did you get in here?”
The deft girl in front of her shrugged, a knowing smirk on her lips. “It’s a Horde secret,” she teased, her smirk growing. “So, enjoying your victory?”
“I wouldn’t exactly call it a victory. People were hurt. Entrapta...” Adora’s eyes downcasted, tears forming. “What do you want?”
“Me?” Catra asked, her hand against her chest in mock surprise. “I just wanted to see you. See the person who betrayed me for some princesses she barely knew.”
“Catra you know what the Horde is doing is wrong,” Adora told her, gripping her sheets. “You know I can’t in good conscience go back to that. Not after everything I’ve seen.” Adora visibly shuddered before looking back at her former friend. “I’m not going back.”
Catra frowned, annoyance over taking her smugness. “After all we’ve been through. You still chose to cling to people who are only using you for that stupid sword. Can’t you see? Can’t you see that the only person who really cares about you is me?”
“Are you?!” Adora demanded, crossing the space between them. “Because if you really truly cared about me, you’d want me to be happy,”
“Don’t act like you know how much I care about you,” Catra snarled, pushing the blonde in front of her. “You have no idea what I go through every day for you. Shadow Weaver uses me as a punching bag for your mistakes. Do you know who takes the fall for everything you do? Me. And do I ever complain? No. Because I know that you’d do the same for me.” She turned away from Adora. “At least, that’s what I used to think.”
“Hey!” Adora shouts, grabbing her arm. “You know I’d do the same for you. Things are just...Complicated right now. I don’t know who I am anymore...and it seems like Glimmer and the others...they can help me figure it out. The Horde raised me, raised us, but they didn’t do a very good job of it.”
“You left me behind, you left me there to deal with the consequences of your actions,” Catra responded, pushing a finger into the other girl’s chest. “Did you think Shadow Weaver was just, a okay with you switching sides? Who do you think she took her anger out on huh? Scorpia? Kyle?”
Adora pressed her lips into a thin line. “Catra I—”
“Why didn’t you take me with you?” Catra’s voice shook with sadness. Anger. Sorrow. “You didn’t even offer until you had gone off and made new friends. I was an afterthought. Just like Entrapta.”
Adora’s eyebrows furrowed. “What do you mean just like Entrapta? Is she, is she still—”
“Yeah,” Catra confirmed. “Not that you’d care. You and your precious rebellion left her to die. If it wasn’t for me and Scorpia she would have been killed.”
“We thought—I thought—” Adora couldn’t exactly process what was going on right now. She honestly couldn’t even tell if she was dreaming, or if this was a real thing that was happening right here, right now. Entrapta? Alive? Why hadn’t she tried to get into contact with them?
“Don’t bother trying to figure out a way to get her back,” Catra interjected, pulling Adora from her racing thoughts. “She doesn’t want to come back. Not after she realized you guys were just using her. Some friends you are. Especially you Adora. You abandoned someone not once, but twice. Nice track record you got there.”
“We didn’t know! Everyone said she was dead! They saw her die! If any of us had known we would have gone back for her! Don’t sit her and act like the Horde is treating her any better! She’s probably locked up right now in some dark dungeon!”
Catra’s smirk returned. “Actually, she’s become well adjusted to Horde life. She’s even the one who helped us invade Bright Moon.”
Adora frowned. “You’re lying,”
“Nope,” Catra responded, popping the ‘p’. “Girl’s really got a knack for tinkering. In a few days she improved the Horde’s technology faster than anyone ever could. And it’s all thanks to her knowledge of First One’s tech.” she patted Adora’s cheek mockingly. “You wouldn’t be in this situation if you hadn't abandoned one of your precious princesses. Such a shame that your rebellion has lost such an important ally. I wonder what they would think if they found out you failed them?”
Adora smacked her hand away. “I didn’t fail them. I protect Bright Moon. You’re the one who failed. You couldn’t destroy Bright Moon, and you couldn’t bring me back to the Fright Zone.” She smirked. “Don’t go projecting your short comings on to me.”
Catra’s nostrils flared. “Why you little—” She hissed, lifting Adora up by her shirt. “Don’t act like we didn’t receive the same training. I can kill you just as easily as I snuck in here!”
Adora’s grin never left her face. “But you haven’t. I wonder why. Is it because you care too much? Or is it because you’re afraid?”
Catra dropped her in surprise. “What?! I don’t like you! I don’t care about you either! I’m just doing my job!” she picked up Adora’s sword from the ground, holding the sharp blade to Adora’s throat. “And that means bringing you back alive whether I like it or not,” she tapped Adora’s chin with the blade, chuckling darkly. “Don’t be mistaken. I’m not here to gloat, or ask for redemption. I’m here to warn you that I will stop at nothing to get what I want from now on. And if that means taking you down?” Catra stabbed Adora’s sword into the ground making the aforementioned girl jump.
“So be it.”
“Catra—”
Adora had reached out to grab her, but realized she had been reaching out to nothing. She was in her bed, the sheets pulled up to her chest, covered in sweat. Had that whole thing been a dream? Or had Catra really snuck into her room?
She was about to brush it off as a lucid dream when she saw her sword sticking out of the floor.
No, this was very real. And it was very much far from over.