Chapter 13

Luz Noceda slept fitfully.

A desperate battle. Magic, might, and every bit of will thrown at a vast, ravening darkness – a consumptive force that has wrapped around the Titan itself. The Boiling Isles vast corpse-form rising up from the seas, growling and gasping and lashing its claws about. Reaching. Eda and King were there, claws and magic alike weaving together.

And it wasn’t enough.

Because she wasn’t there.

Luz jerked upright, moments before the massive, clawed hand came down on her loved ones. The fear that clenched at her chest was eclipsed by only one thing – her head bonking directly into the bunk bed above her. She hissed, grabbing onto her head, her eyes half closed. “Owwwww!” She hissed, softly – not wanting to wake the others sleeping around her. The room was full of bunk beds, the light still dimmed, the soft susurrations of their breathing being the only noise she could hear. Her foot, though, pressed against something warm and soft and very much not herself. She blinked and looked down at the foot of the bed.

With her light adapted eyes, it was hard to not see Catra there, curled up, her tail twitching as she slept softly.

Luz had chosen a bed relatively close to Catra, despite trying her best to storm off. The reason was fairly simple: There were just not that many unused beds in this room, the Horde had a lot of soldiers and crammed them into barracks something fierce. But still, seeing Catra there made her do a little double take. She opened her mouth quietly, then closed it. Catra rolled onto her back, her hands lifting above her body as she kneaded at the air in the most kittenish gesture that Luz had ever seen. Sleeping, relaxed, her face was even cuter than it was when she was all sharp angles and focus. She made a soft mewing noise, then pawed more.

Mas te vale you stupid girl, she’s an evil gata! Luz put her hands over her face, trying to cram the sudden rush of feelings. The feelings weren’t all just good – yes, she wanted to immediately bundle Catra into a blanket and protect her from all bad things, which seemed to be a fairly natural reaction considering Scorpia. But she also...

God.

How could she be the worst girlfriend? Ever?

She was a whole dimension away from Amity, and rather than spending every single second of her life trying to get back to her, she was sleeping! Thinking about other girls! Lying to people! Okay, well, the lying to people was kind of important. But still. She laid back on the bed, looking up at the bunk bed above her. Feeling guilty about Amity shifted quite smoothly to worrying about Eda and King. And Mom. And Stringbean! She had only had her palisman for what felt like five seconds and now she was separated from them!

Fear hit then.

What if Belos took over the island again. What if he’s able to crush Eda like a bug.

Then anger.

I’d won! I beat him! He cheated!

Then fear again.

Amity must think I’m dead. Or worse. Is there worse?

Then guilt.

And I’m thinking of a gata-girl instead of her!?

Then fear.

What if they’re already dead? Are we working like Cosmic Frontier time travel rules, or Jill and Zed? Or-

Then a nose bumped against her ear. Soft, wet, kittenish, there was a single dizzying moment of pure sapphic panic at the though that Catra had gone from sleep cuteining to sleep smootching, but then Luz rolled onto her side and had to clap her hand over her mouth to keep from waking the entire barracks up.

Because there, wriggling all snake style next to her head on her pillow ... was Stringbean!

Her palisman had taken a dang long time to hatch, considering she had carved his egg from pure, untouched palisman wood – she had waited for them to come out for what felt like an eternity, and when she had finally popped out, Stringbean had come out just perfect: A snakeshifter, able to take any number of forms, and genderqueer, too! Except unlike Luz, they weren’t a coward and used multiple pronouns. It wasn’t that Luz was scared of being called he/him, it’s just that that idea made her want to shrivel up into a ball. Like, even if she was, for example, turned into a handsome prince via an evil frog’s kiss, she’d still want to be a she/her. Maybe them.

Stringbean had no such compunctions, and proved it by strutting around with he/him pronouns for a bit. Of course, it was easier for him to do that then it was for Luz to do it, because palismans could communicate their intentions using their mental connections to their witches.

Luz, her hand still over her mouth, sat up again. She tried think-talking to Stringbean.

How did you get here!?

The mental image unfolded in her mind – her tumbling into the portal, Stringbean darting forward and sweeping into her pocket. There he curled up. The next image was her being dragged away by Lonnie and Rogellio, both of them bickering over who was going to carry her more. Stringbean rolled out of her pocket in the shape of a stylus, and laid on the ground, as if she was just a normal little cute pen for writing things. Then when no one was looking at him, they rolled away into a vent, falling in with a soft tink.

Luz nodded slowly, then gave him a thumbs up. Good job! She thought, then picked Stringbean up, hugging his tiny, snakey body to her chest, nuzzling the top of his head. Just touching him made her skin feel less like it was going to peel itself off her body and leave her as a very anxious skeleton.

Now, we just need to keep you safe from the Horde. They might want to experiment on you or something! She thought. Stringbean booped her nose with her nose, clearly amused at the very idea of being ‘caught’. He shifted into a stylus and then slid into her pocket.

“You up?”

Luz jerked so hard that her head slammed into the bottom of the bunk above her again. She hissed, grabbing the top of her head as she turned and glowered at Catra, who was laying on her side, head propped up on her arm. Her smirk was quite wicked.

“Y-You!” Luz hissed softly. “You’re not allowed to be suave! You sleep-walked into my bed!”

“Who said I sleep walked?” Catra asked, then rolled up onto her hands and knees. With a fluid motion, she pounced and Luz found herself on her back, arms pinned above her head. The lithe shape of Catra loomed above her, grinning down at her – shadows making only her teeth and her heterochromatic eyes glint above her. Catra leaned in close, her voice soft. “What if I’m just trying to make sure my new partner doesn’t do anything ... suspicious?”

“U-Uh, uh...” Luz said, gulping hard. Those feelings of anger, fear and guilt were twirling in her brain like someone had taken the big wheel from the Price is Fortunate and thrown it hard. It ticked, ticked, slowed, stopped right on oh fuck me horny.

Catra snorted. “You’re so easy to tease,” she said, then pushed herself onto the balls of her bare feet. “C’mon.” She shifted out from under the bunk bed with a lithe grace, standing and padding off, her tail drawing a line through the air that Luz had to follow or die. Luz scrambled out, grabbing her hoodie as she did so – while her snakeshifter bestie writhed up next to her ear, chittering softly.

“It’s okay, Stringbean,” Luz whispered. “I know what I’m doing.”

Stringbean seemed less than certain. But they flitted into one of Luz’s pockets as she followed Force Captain Catra from the bedroom.

The chamber that Luz stood in was large and undecorated, save for a zigging and zagging pattern of white hexagons on the floor. The walls were narrow and tall and the lights were dimmed. Catra stood before her in the room, with a staff in one hand. She slammed the butt into the floor and leaned on the staff, her grin lopsided. “So, Noceda,” she said. “I’m putting my neck out for you. That means I gotta know if you can actually keep up.”

Luz crossed her arms over her chest. “And you decided doing it before breakfast is the best time? Cause then no one can see me mess up and make you look stupid?”

Catra blinked, looking a little surprised. Then she snorted and underhanded her staff at Luz, who caught it with an oof as it slammed into her belly horizontally. She stumbled backwards, her hands gripping onto the staff, while Catra snatched up something from behind her back and tossed it too. With reflexes honed firmly by several games of grudgby, Luz managed to botch catching whatever it was, then pop it up on one knee and end up with it balanced on her nose as she nearly toppled over backwards. She flailed, then finally managed to get her staff beside her and the other thing in her hand. It was a helmet, with a transparent visor. She slid it onto her head, a little nervously, while the hexagonal floor started to rumble and shake. Metal poles thrust up from the ground – and in the visor, she saw them outlined in a hazy augmented reality.

The poles were now trees.

Oh well.

That was nice.

They were spooky trees, though.

Luz scoffed. “I’ll have you know, I’ve handled spooky forests before,” she said.

“Mm. Yeah. And have those forests ever had princesses in them?” Catra asked, walking around to stand behind her. “Deadly, magical princesses? Who’ll stop at nothing to take you out?”

“Uh ... you know, in my world, princess has a very different connotation,” Luz said.

“We’re not in your world, Noceda,” Catra said, her voice sharp. “So, if you can get to the end of this course without, ya know, dying horribly, then I’ll keep my word and won’t tell Shadow Weaver that you need to have your brain scrambled. Deal?”

“Uh-”

“Go!” Catra said, and a loud buzzing noise sounded.

Luz breathed in sharply, then breathed out. “Right,” she whispered, then tucked her head forward. “Ready, Stringo?”

Stringbean squeaked at her. She was ready. Okay.

Luz started forward, moving at a steady clip, her shoulders tensed. She had to rely on her two strengths: Reflexes and creativity. Now, yes, she was lacking her magic, but-

A robot popped out of the ground and fired a laser beam at her head. The bot, through her visor, looked like a sinister feminine figure, triangular faced, glowing white eyed, writhing with magical power. Luz flung herself to the side, rolled, came to her feet and swung her staff like a bat. “Hatcha!” she shouted, and the staff connected with the bot’s spherical body with a reverberating clang that rang up her wrists, arms, and shoulders. The bot seemed roughly as perturbed as a boulder might have. Instead, it swung one of its four stubby limbs around and tried to take Luz’s head off. Luz yelped and ducked low. She rolled backwards, came to her feet again, then yelped and put a metal tree between her and the bot as it started to blast where she had stood. The beams struck the tree and filled the air with smoke and sparks.

“Auugh, I wish I had a pen!” Luz hissed.

Stringbean popped out of her pocket and transformed into a pen. Luz gaped, then snatched her shapeshifting palisman out of the air.

“Ohhhh, you’re the best!” She whispered, doing her best to snuggle the pen. Then she scrawled the new rune she had picked up on the ground – but she wasn’t some newbie witch like she had been back on the Boiling Isles. She knew that if you modified runes, you could alter their properties. She just needed to learn the modifiers, and what better time to practice than when under laserfire from a killer robot in a psychotic training simulation run by an evil catgirl?

Well, lots of times, Luz thought, raggedly, as she slapped the rune and sprang backwards. The bot lurched around the tree, trying to draw a bead, and a purple spear of light exploded from the rune and impaled the bot, which stumbled backwards then exploded with a roar of smoke and fire. Luz coughed, covering her mouth with her hand – while an alert bzzed out and the fake trees dropped into their hexes.

Catra, looking a bit like someone had knocked over her favorite sandcastle, was hurrying over. “What are you doing!?” she exclaimed.

“Winning?” Luz asked, dazed as she brushed her helmet back and off her head, letting it crash to the ground behind her with an alarming sound of plastic on metal.

“You’re supposed to disable the bots, not blow them up! Those things are expensive!” Catra said. “I-” she caught herself, then put her hands over her face. “Oh nooo, I sound like Adora.”

Luz blinked at her, then grinned a little sheepishly. “Well, does it mean I passed the test?”

Catra let her hands fall from her face. “Ugh. Maybe. But now we have to explain why the bot exploded.” She glowered at it.

“I’m just awesome?” Luz suggested.

That startled an almost amused laugh out of Catra – and then she froze. Luz knew immediately that something was wrong – purple red lightning buzzed and crackled along Catra’s body, sliding from her feet to her shoulders. Her spine went straight and her eyes were wide – while a furious voice snarled out from behind her.

“You.”

Luz stepped to Catra’s side, her hands clenched, as she saw Shadow Weaver floating into the training room.

Before Luz could say anything, Shadow Weaver flicked her finger and Catra cried out in pain, falling to her knees and spinning around – an invisible force twisting her around like a top. Shadow Weaver glared down at her. “You dare and tap into the Black Garnet? You think you can meddle with my experiments, you useless-”

“Hey!” Luz shouted, then sprang between Catra and Shadow Weaver, her arms spreading wide. “Let her go! I was the one who tapped your frigging gemstone! Hurt me.” She put her hand on her chest. “If you’re gonna hurt anyone – but, before you do, maybe check with Hordak – he might be a little annoyed to find you damaging the best chance he had to get off this planet.”

“What are you talking about?” Shadow Weaver asked, sounding taken aback.

She doesn’t know, Luz realized. She clung to that information, with a white knuckle grip. She tried to give her most confident little smirk, her arms crossing over her chest to hide the fact that her hands were shaking, that she wished she had brought the staff with her and not left it discarded back in the training room’s heart. She lifted her chin, and said, clearly: “If you’re not authorized to know, then it’s not my place.”

“Lying to me is a dangerous game,” Shadow Weaver said, her voice soft. “Catra has been doing it since she was a child – and she’s never managed it.”

“Try me then,” Luz snapped. “Go to Hordak. Ask about portals and First Ones. Assuming he doesn’t destroy you for the ... the...” She thought of the best possible word she could, and found it. Book six, chapter two. “ ... temerity.”

Shadow Weaver lifted a hand, fingers twisting into a claw, as if she was going to strike Luz full in the face – but the momentary flash of pure, hateful rage passed in a moment and she lowered her hand. As she did so, the buzzing and humming sound behind Luz faded. She heard Catra’s ragged breath – a sigh that held more tears than sobbing could have. She ached in her bones with the sympathetic urge. But she forced herself to stay still, looking up into those white eyes.

“You’re ... going to be an interesting subject, Luz the Human,” Shadow Weaver said, then turned and started to float away. “But if you touch my magic again, I will make you wish that you were dead.”

Then she left the room.

Luz puffed out a sigh. “Oof! That is one moy mala mama jama,” she said, turning around to face Catra ... and found that Catra was glaring daggers at her, her teeth clenched. The look in her eyes was pure murder. “Um, are you oka-” she reached for Catra, but Catra snarled and slashed at the air with her claws. Luz yanked her hand back, but not before pain bloomed – and bright red blood, flashing across her palm. She clutched at her wrist, her eyes wide.

“I don’t need your help!” Catra snapped, springing to her feet.

Luz gaped at her. “I don’t know, where I come from, friends help when their friends are being tortured.”

Not that she’s my friend. I’m lying to her.

The thought felt very distant and cold, like stepping into mud, feeling it slide down your socks, into your shoes. Luz tried to ignore it.

“I’m not your friend!” Catra shouted, getting into Luz’s face. “And I don’t need a friend!”

Luz bit back her immediate response. She looked aside – but Catra didn’t immediately storm off. Instead, she said. “ ... do ... you need a ... a bandage for that?”

Luz flushed. “Nah. It’s fine!” She said, while blood dripped between her fingers and onto the floor. She glanced back and saw that Catra had ducked her head forward, her massive bloom of hair hiding her features. Before Luz could say anything, Catra had grabbed her two wrists in one hand – easy, considering Luz was clutching herself – and started dragging her off towards the medical facility.

Catra yanked the bandage sharply taut against Luz’s palm and she hissed. “Wow!” she exclaimed. “You forget how much healing sucks when you don’t have immediate access to healing magic.” She flexed her fingers, feeling the throbbing pain of the disinfectant spray and green goop that Catra had slopped onto him – then looked up at Catra, who had stood and stalked to the corner of the room, where she was beginning to pace, frowning intently.

Gosh, she’s cute when she’s pensive, Luz thought.