I've been having a major, brutal battle with writer's block and it has interfered with many of my other fanfics. It's been, I think, a whole year since I updated and I really started to miss it. I think I've started breaking ground again, although by this time I've definitely lost most of my readership... All of that aside, this ficlet is majorly angsty and born of my absolute frustration at the blow my Starco ship has taken with the latest episode (Starcrushed).

All the same, here is my attempt as surviving this hard time, so, please R&R? Many thanks.

Disclaimer: I do not own the characters and/or locations in this fan fiction story that you may recognise from the TV show (SVTFOE). I am only responsible for the plot.

"Ma...o...Mar...o...rco..."

The voice seemed far away and yet, so familiar. Marco woke with a start and looked around the room. It was just the same as it had been before... after...

He sighed and rubbed a frustrated hand down his face. It had been five years since that day. He'd grown up. Well, he should have. He still had friends... and his parents...

He flopped back onto the bed.

It wouldn't be the same.

Of course not.

Star Butterfly had flown into his life completely unannounced. She had made him see worlds he could only dream of, experience things that he never in his wildest dreams thought he would have. Then she'd flown right out of it in pretty much the same way. His phone glowed beside him with a new message.

Was it even weird that he wasn't surprised?

You up?

It was Jackie. She had been checking up on him every so often. He sighed deeply and typed back a reply.

M: Yeah. Did you sleep?

The reply was almost immediate.

J: Do you think I could? Finals coming up.

M: No. I guess not.

J: Did you dream about her again?

M: Yeah. Third time today. Even my daydreams aren't safe.

J: Marco, maybe you should talk to your folks again?

He looked at the screen for a long time. He hadn't really been the same since the end of year party all that time ago. He had lost a lot more than he thought he would. It had been brutal. He'd somehow managed to get to this point - pretty much lived in a daze.

He picked up his phone and typed back a reply.

M: I miss her.

She'd left his world on the night before summer began. Of course, he'd been dating Jackie then. She had left him to think about things a few minutes later and that had essentially ended that. Losing Star had been a major blow – but he had to hand it to her, she did know how to make an exit.

After she'd left, he followed her with his dimensional scissors. He found her barely clinging to life with Mewnie about to crumble. Toffee was winning the fight and what he'd seen in her eyes was the kind of defeat nobody should ever have to face. Then she'd smiled as she hugged him tight, stolen his scissors and cut him a portal to his own dimension – right back into her room.

The last thing he saw was her teary face smiling at him, like she used to back when everything was perfect, before she was engulfed in flame. She'd saved him from Toffee and from certain death at the cost of her own life.

He hugged his knees and took several deep breaths. It wasn't as bad as it had been that first week. He'd gone into a rage and broken everything in his room. Then he'd moved into the spare room – her room. And there he'd been since.

Was he hoping she would come back? Maybe she would make a flashy entrance like she had all those years ago when she first came to live with them. If she did... if she could, he would hold on to her and never, ever let her go.

"Ma...o...Mar...o...rco..."

Marco sat up and looked around. That one couldn't have been a dream... could it? His phone lit up beside him and he grabbed it to see the message that had come. His eyes widened with recognition.

S: Marco Diaz! Come get me now! I don't have time to explain and I'm super sorry I'm telling you like this but you have to get here quick! I'm in Mewnie Castle! You seriously have to hurry, it's life or death!

He stared at the screen for all of three seconds before jumping out of bed. It was too good to be true but any little glimmer of hope could really turn out to be...

He pressed speed dial and held the phone to his ear as he dragged his backpack out from under the bed. He would have liked to stop searching for her, he would, but there was no replacing Star. And as long as there was hope that she was alive, he wouldn't stop looking.

"Ugh, Marco, do you have any idea what time it is?"

"I do," he said with a smile, "but it's important. It's her."

"Marco, we've done this a million times already. Face it, she's not coming back."

He was silent for a moment.

"Then I'll do it a million and one times. Pony, you're the only one who can help."

"Fine, but this better be good."

*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*

"Ah, look, your friends are on their way here," said the lizard sitting back in the Mewnie Castle throne – the only one left standing, "we should get ready to welcome them."

The girl with the matted blonde hair looked up at the portal created by the all-seeing eye through the bars of her cage.

There he was.

She hadn't seen him in so long – it felt like decades. And there he was, coming for her - about to walk into certain doom.

"Ma... Marco... N... N... No..."