"For the honor of Grayskull," Glimmer said, lifting the Sword of Protection above her head.
Nothing.
Just like the first time she'd tried it. Or the second. Or the tenth. Or the twenty-fifth.
The sword only responded to Adora, and Adora responded to nothing.
Sighing, Glimmer set the sword down and got started on what she was actually supposed to be doing – helping Adora.
Bright Moon's healers could do very little, as no one was quite sure what the problem was. Breaking the crystal the first time had eliminated the virus, and Glimmer had made sure the piece of it causing this most recent possession had been powderized. Yet still Adora didn't wake.
Now, all their efforts were on making sure Adora's body could be as healthy as it could be.
It'd been weeks, and Adora only ate what broth Glimmer, Bow, or someone else helped her eat. She'd lost muscle, then fat, to the point where she looked worse than one of the refugees staggering into Bright Moon after harsh travel through the edge of Horde land.
Day by day, Adora wasted away. And she would continue to do so until she woke.
She-Ra's absence also came with a toll. The Alliance might be strong now, but the Horde had suddenly gotten better weapons and many kingdom's natural defenses were devastated. It was why refugees had increased to begin with and the numbers kept rising.
Both the number of refugees and the number of the dead.
Glimmer had known She-Ra was strong. Powerful. The key to several victories. But she hadn't realized how much of the Rebellion's military might had rested on her friend's shoulders until it was gone.
Thanks to their new candidness, Angella had confessed that she didn't think the Rebellion could hold much longer. Within a year, she predicted Etheria to be under Horde control.
Glimmer wanted Adora back, but her people needed She-Ra. So again, Glimmer tried to get the sword to react to her. "For the honor of Grayskull."
Like all the times before, when she tried or another princess or Bow or one of the castle guards, the sword did nothing.
If she hadn't run out of tears days ago, Glimmer would have cried.
####
Bow considered himself a high lever beginner in the maker community. Maybe intermediate. Nowhere near Princess Entrapta's skills, when she had been alive. But with her death, and his own visibility with the Alliance, Bow found himself being relied upon more and more for his mechanical tinkering.
The Horde's weapons were getting more explosive; could he make better shields? Something to gunk up faster tanks? Better trackers to predict an attack?
He found himself on the battlefield less and less, even as Glimmer took on more and more strategic roles. Instead, he spent most of his days in Adora's room tinkering with one gadget or another. He needed a quiet space to work, and he didn't feel right leaving Adora alone.
She'd gone pale. Waxy. Bow didn't care how loopy or lacking of self-preservation she'd be, Bow just wanted Adora to wake up. He wanted the faintly red veins on his friend's arm to go away. For placing her sword in her hand to result in a twitch. For her to even move as naturally as turning over in her sleep.
But nothing. Nothing at all.
Between tearing apart Horde tech and building his own, Bow spent time rebuilding the device Catra had clamped onto Adora's arm. It had puzzled him at first, how low tech it was, until he realized that it wasn't a piece of technology at all. It was a thinly hammered piece of metal, a bracelet, and what had affected Adora and She-Ra was the sliver of a First One's data crystal. He would have expected Glimmer's pulverizing of it to wake up Adora, but felt lost when it didn't.
He felt equally as lost dissecting Horde tech.
"I don't understand," he said to Glimmer, voice soft. They always spoke softly in Adora's room. Just in case.
"Don't understand what?"
"All this tech, it looks like what Entrapta used to build. Since she, since she died, has anyone gone back to Dryl?"
"I think Perfuma did." Glimmer tilted her head, thinking. "She offered to take in those who wanted to leave, now that Dryl was princess-less. It's a small kingdom, but surrounded by other kingdoms and not in huge danger. Though I can imagine it would be annexed into another kingdom eventually. There was no one left after Entrapta."
Bow sat silently for a moment in honor of their fallen friend, before continuing his train of thought. "These look like Entrapta's designs. I think there's a big chance someone from the Horde is in Dryl, or went there to steal information."
Glimmer frowned. "You're probably right. Ug." She fell backwards, clutching at her head. "I should have thought of that last month."
Bow reached out and patted her knee. "You can act on that thought later. But what I'm trying to say is, if the Horde stole information from Entrapta's computers, we need to get it too. It'll help me figure out this new tech they have, and hopefully, I can find some of her old notes about," his gaze drifted to Adora, "what happened last time."
They both went silent.
"I'll see if we can leave tomorrow," Glimmer said. "The sooner we get to Dryl, the better. I'll see if someone will look after Adora while we're gone."
####
Dryl had been slightly depressing before, Glimmer would admit, but it felt worse now. No one greeted them, but the still active robots had kept the castle clean. The effect was a very sterile museum. Or mausoleum, Glitter amended when they came to the first hallway cross roads.
A portrait hung across from them. It showed a young Entrapta, thirteen or so, smiling with two robots behind her. The king and queen of Dryl had both lost their lives in the first half of the war with the Hordak. They'd been the first serious loss of the Rebellion, and Dryl the first kingdom to succeed from the Princess Rebellion.
Glimmer tried not to think about how Dryl's final fall might be a negative turning point too.
There was an odd collection of items beneath the portrait. The wilting flowers were a surprise, Glimmer thought the robots would have cleaned them, and also a small collection of robot parts. Gifts from the robots or more appropriate than flowers from lingering citizens, Glimmer had no idea.
"I feel bad," Bow said. "I didn't bring anything."
"What about an arrow? Do you have a sonic one?"
"I do, actually." Bow pulled it out and laid it on the ground amongst the other memorial items.
Glimmer had lost a lot of people to this war. Parents, friends, extended family. But none of them quite hurt the way Entrapta's lost did. Probably because the Alliance, in a way, traded Entrapta's life for Glimmer's.
She pciked a hallway and marched down it, Bow shouting from behind asking her to slow down.
One of the things Glimmer hated about the war was how you had to balance lives. Her mom did it, Adora did it, but Glimmer had a hard time thinking the same way. Unless it was those of Horde soldiers.
"Are you upset?" Bow asked, reaching her.
"I…" Glimmer sagged, her anger melting away as she stopped. "Guilty, I think."
"What happened to Entrapta wasn't your fault. We all knew the risks. We all volunteered."
Glimmer still wasn't sure she had been worth those risks, that loss. Entrapta's loss destroyed a whole kingdom.
"Hey." Bow slung an arm around Glimmer's shoulders. "All of this is the Horde's fault. Entrapta death, Adora's condition. And we'll beat them. Because we're awesome."
Glimmer sniffled, running a hand under her nose. "Yeah. Yeah, you're right. Let's go find Entrapta's lab."
The hallway was like others they passed through. Cold, clean. Lined with portraits. There one was full of Entrapta holding up various robot animals. A cat. Dog. Squirrel. What looked to be a very aggressive octopus. But eventually, landmarks sparked in her brain. Together, she and Bow turned corner after corner until they come across a large steel door.
It was ten inches thick. And they knew that because it was open.
"Shit." Glimmer hurried forward to peak into the lab. The Horde had been here, but it didn't look like they destroyed things. At least, the computers still gave off a warm hum.
Bow went straight for the computer terminal. They didn't have computers in Bright Moon, not like this at least, but some families had personal tech. Bow's dad were scavengers, gathering old Horde technology and doing what they could with it, so he had some idea of how to navigate Entrapta's machine. Glimmer left him to it.
Instead, she looked around the room.
She remembered lots of recorders lying around. They were gone. Above, where creepy robots hung suspended, there were a few gaps. There was a large pile of rock and scrap parts, the result of the explosion months ago last time Glimmer was there. Someone, probably Entrapta, had started to organize it. And on the other side-
"Bow!" she shouted.
Glimmer thought the original First One's data crystal had been destroyed, but here the majority of it laid. It pulsed an angry red, crystal vines digging into the scrap parts around it. So far, nothing it touched seemed affected by the virus, which she was thankful for.
"Why did it activate?" Bow asked, reaching out to touch it only to be blocked by an energy shield. "Oh yeah, it was all about self-defense. We only managed to get if off Adora because she was so covered in goo she couldn't fight."
Glimmer eyed the crystal. "Would that work again?" She needed to destroy it. Pulverize it. Turn it into sand so she could go home and see Adora look at her and smile.
"Maybe? It doesn't look like it has anything to defend itself with right now. Just the shield." As Bow spoke, he pushed tech away in an ever-widening circle. The few parts the crystal had attached to rattled, but didn't move. Still, Bow made sure to keep his fingers away from anything that might snap close.
"What if I just hit it really hard?"
"How hard? Glimmer, what are you doing?!"
"Stand back, Bow!"
Glimmer pulled out her father's staff, then teleported into the air ten feet above the crystal. Using the force of gravity and her own body weight, she slammed the end of the staff into the crystal. For a brief moment, her staff hit the shield and stopped. Glimmer forced her magic into it. The staff shimmered. The shield broke and tinkered to the floor.
When Glimmer's staff hit the crystal, she was instantly propelled backwards by a small explosion. She tumbled into Bow, who caught her and rolled. When the ringing in her ears stopped, she pushed herself up. "Is it destroyed?"
She ran over to check, Bow at her heels.
"It's no longer glowing," Bow pointed out. "I think the virus part stopped."
Glimmer swung her staff back. "So I can fully destroy it then?"
"Hit away."
She pounded at it. With each crack of the crystal she imagined Adora's eyes fluttering, taking a deep breath and waking up. How as the red faded from the crystal, the pink would creep back into Adora's skin. When she was done, crystal blasted with brute force and moonstone magic, Glimmer was hunched over and heaving.
"You done?"
Glimmer turned to look at Bow, who flinched back.
"No." She glared. "Do you have an exploding arrow, because after that, I'll be done. And then we are scattering this powder all over Etheria."
"I'm saving the exploding arrow for the lab."
Glimmer growled. Bow threw his hands up as if holding off one of the Whispering Wood's giant insects.
"Easy! But this whole place has to be destroyed. I checked the logs, someone did come before us and they took a lot of Entrapta's files. They've been replicating her work, building off of it, for the Horde. We have to make sure if they, or anyone else comes back, they'll find nothing. Including the remains of that crystal. Or at least, what was here."
Right. Because she remembered the crystal being a three-pointed star, and they had only found two points. Someone had the third point, most likely the Horde. Glimmer prayed it was ineffective now that the rest of it was damaged. She wanted to teleport right to Adora's room and check, but even with the boost of power all the princesses in the Alliance had noticed after touching the Sword of Protection, she couldn't travel that far in a blink.
She sighed. "Okay. Let's destroy the lab."
Bow pulled out the designated arrow. "I planned for this, so it will blow up extra big. I mixed the chemicals myself."
"I trust your arrows, Bow. I'm sure it'll be enough to make sure none of this falls into more Horde hands."
They walked out, Bow pausing in the doorway to load an arrow. "Once I hit the power, things will start exploding fast."
Glimmer stepped closer. "I'll get us out of here as soon as things start going boom."
Taking a deep breath, Bow released his arrow. It struck true, and the generator powering all the computers and screens went fhoom. Glimmer felt the heat on her face before she teleported Bow and herself out of there.
They ended up in the courtyard of Dryl, the cascading explosions muffled but still in range, surrounded by robots responding to the noise. Cleaning robots rushed towards the lab, others went slower with arms full of parts that might be needed for repairs. One or two had first aid supplies. Glimmer guessed explosions had been pretty common when Entrapta was alive, and she had programed her robotic staff to bring her repair and recovery supplies.
Thankfully, none of the robots seemed to mind Glimmer and Bow. After half a minute, a deep rumbling sound reached their ears. The castle crumbling, Glimmer guessed. The first time they had been here, they'd brought down the ceiling of the lab. No doubt, Bow's exploding arrow took out more now.
A part of Glimmer twinged. Dryl was a dead kingdom, and she'd just helped destroyed the only significant bit left of it. But a damaged castle was worth an intact Etheria.
"Ready to go?" Bow asked.
"Yeah."
#####
Glimmer sat in the window seat of Adora's room, staring out but seeing nothing. Destroying the majority of the crystal had helped: Adora's color was better, she breathed more deeply, her body responded well to more substantial food, and occasionally she did twitch her fingers.
She still slept though. And she still wasted away, simply more slowly than before.
The only thing left to do was sneak into the Fright Zone, find the other piece of the crystal, and destroy it, but Glimmer didn't know where to start.
And Angella had said… had said…
You need to accept the fact that Adora will die.
Sobbing, Glimmer thrust her head into the space between her knees and stomach.
She'd give anything to heal Adora. Anything.
#####
It had been a full month since Catra last saw Adora. She saw Glimmer. Bow. They both fought fiercely, especially against her. Righteous anger, Catra supposed. After all, she had infected their friend with a First One's virus.
And Adora was still infected.
This could kill her.
Scorpia's warning circled Catra's head at least once a day, but no one in the Rebellion had sworn at Catra for killing She-Ra so she assumed the virus had done what it had been supposed to. Stop Adora from transforming.
Except, she knew Adora. Or liked to think she did. With or without turning into She-Ra, she'd be on the battlefield.
Only halfway paying attention, Catra watched Entrapta poke the glowing First One's crystal. It had dimmed a few days ago, but still glowed, and the princess was trying to figure out why.
"I thought I had dismantled its connection to the rest of the crystal. I knew the crystal could communicate with pieces outside itself, but I always assumed there was a range limit. Though, the crystal on the bracelet still worked in the Whispering Woods when Catra put in on Adora. Was that father than Dryl? I must find a map!" Her hair replicated hands, one a fist pounding into the flat palm of another. Then Entrapta scurried away to the desk in the lab's corner filled with paper work.
Catra lashed her tail, staring at the glowing crystal. What had it done to Adora? Was she constantly loopy, like in the video from Dryl? Kept out of the fight for her own protection? Had the aggressive nature from the Woods not worn off, so she was kept chained in a cell? Could she not tell friend from foe? Entrapta seemed convinced the crystal's actions were driven by self-defense, if you expected everything to hurt you, you could drive yourself to exhaustion pretty quickly. Had Adora turned into a paranoid, violent woman hidden away for the safety of all? Being put through training to not hit princesses?
"I brought cake!" Scorpia walked into the lab, a tray in hand, covered with an arrangement of tea cakes in various shades of red.
Entrapta squealed in delight and rushed over, already stuffing them in her mouth. Catra watched, tail twitching agitatedly.
"Don't you want one, Catra?" Scorpia asked. "I helped Cook make them myself."
"No." Catra turned back to the pulsing data crystal. A minute later, she felt Scorpia step next to her.
"Have just one cake? I don't think I've seen you eat in the past two days."
Catra grabbed one and stuffed it in her mouth whole.
"Oh, look at your puffy cheeks!"
Catra glared at the Force Captain, glad Scorpia's pinchers saved her from pinched cheeks. "There. I ate."
"Thank you. You're worrying me, just a little bit."
Catra scoffed. "Don't."
"We're friends. I'm allowed to worry. Just like your worried about Adora."
"I'm not-"
"You are." Scorpia leaned forward into Catra's space, a big smile on her face. "I think it's cute. But," Scorpia's face fell. "I know you have a real reason to worry."
Together, they looked at the data crystal.
"I don't," Catra insisted.
"She-Ra hasn't shown up in a month-"
"Which means it's working." Catra turned on the other woman, hissing with her hair standing on end.
Scorpia frowned at her, disappointed, and Catra resisted the desire to slink away. Instead, she lifted her chin.
"I. Am. Not. Worrying."
"Then prove it by coming to dinner with me in the mess."
Catra flicked her tail, back and forth, back and forth. Eventually, she caved. "Fine."
Dinner would be a good distraction.
####
"RAAAAAAHHHHHH!"
The teleporting princess came out of nowhere, causing Catra to duck and roll to avoid getting skulled by a staff. She mostly made it; Glimmer's staff came down midway through her tail. Catra yowled in pain.
Glimmer gave Catra no reprieve, kicking her in the lower back. The shift in the princess's weight allowed Catra to pull her tail free. No longer restricted, she rolled forward, avoiding Glimmer's next kick, and pushed herself up in a crouch with her claws extended.
The princess teleported, straight behind Catra, who expected it and dodged left. She managed to swipe Glimmer's arm, drawing blood, but the princess didn't seem to notice. She snarled at Catra, more animal like then Catra on an average day.
But what really caught Catra's attention was Glimmer's red eyes. Sure, something in the air could have bothered her, but paired with Glimmer's simmering anger Catra pegged the cause as angry tears.
Catra's mind flashed to Adora. Who, again, wasn't on the battlefield. Who, Catra's suddenly hiccupping heart wondered, might be dead.
It was a split-second thought, a microsecond of fear, and Glimmer took advantage of it. Catra's head exploded with light as the princess slammed the end of her staff into Catra's temple. When she woke up after the three-second blackout, Catra found herself on her back, Glimmer sitting on her chest, and Glimmer's hand uncomfortably pressed into her throat.
"Is there a piece of a First One's data crystal in the Fright Zone?" Glimmer spat.
Catra yanked at Glimmer's hand. She could still breath, but hated the idea of being pinned by a sparkly princess.
Glimmer pressed her hand in. "Is there?"
"Did it do something to Adora?" Catra forced herself to smirk.
In answer, Glimmer punched her with a glittery punch. The magic didn't do much, just make stars literally appear in Catra's vision, but the force behind the punch would give Catra a black eye.
"I'll take that as a yes," Catra said.
With another yell, Glimmer delivered another punch. She paused where her fist cocked back for a third punch. "You will destroy that data crystal. As soon as you get back."
"And if I don't?" Catra kept her voice bland.
"Then, then..."
Those red eyes were very much the result of tears. Because the Princess above her was shedding them now. Slowly, reluctantly, doing her best to not cry in front of an enemy, but Glimmer was crying nonetheless.
"I know you two aren't friends anymore," Glimmer whispered, "but if you don't destroy that piece of First One's tech today then Adora won't last the week."
You don't show weakness in the Horde, but something must have shown on Catra's face because Glimmer unclenched her fist. Her face, while not going soft became less scowlly.
"I know this is war. People die." Glimmer brought both her hands to rest on her thighs and Catra took in a big gulp of air as the princess went on. "But we always do what we can to protect those close to us. Important to us. And I will do a lot for Adora. I'll beg, if you want me to. Be your prisoner again in the Fright Zone. As long as you destroy that data crystal."
When Glimmer brought up hand to brush at the tears falling down her face, Catra bucked up to dislodge her. Free of the princess's weight, Catra scrambled away as fast as she could into a nearby tree.
Glimmer didn't follow. She stood in the small clearing, staring at Catra. "Please."
"I don't have any First One's tech," Catra spat out before disappearing.
She didn't want to see Glimmer's reaction to that.
#####
"How do you think Entrapta would react if I asked her to destroy the crystal?" Catra asked Scorpia in the tank home.
"Why not just destroy it yourself?"
Catra huffed, tail twitching. "She fixed it the first time it was destroyed. I don't want that to happen again."
"It really did hurt Adora, didn't it?" Scorpia sounded way sadder than she should. As far as Catra knew, Scorpia and Adora had never meet. And Adora was Horde Enemy number one right now.
Catra didn't give the Force Captain an answer.
"Entrapta will want a reason why," Scorpia said. "You'll have to come up with a good one."
So Adora doesn't die was a good reason, but it wasn't a Horde reason. And it wasn't an Entrapta one either. Of all the princess's Catra had met, Entrapta was the one most similar to the idea of them the Horde told recruits. Cold, calculating, monstrous, and out of control. Entrapa didn't have powers that got out of hand, but her way of looking at human life so objectively, so lacking of standard morals...it was a wonder she hadn't been picked up by the Horde before.
To Entrapta, Adora dying wasn't a reason a stop. It was a reason to study effects. Adora's death wasn't a knife in the heart, but data on paper.
Catra didn't realize she'd curled her fist in her hand until Scorpia covered it with her pincher.
The truth is, Catra doesn't want Entrapta to destroy the crystal. She wants to do it. The more the idea sits in her head, the larger it becomes. No doubt, the Rebellion had destroyed the crystal pieces they could get their hands on. Why couldn't Catra do the same? Punch it, burn it, stomp on it.
She didn't have magic powers. Or knowledge of explosions. Her body was built for slashing and the thing seemed to have its own defenses. The crystal had to be 100% destroyed. The consequences of otherwise were too high. And it had to happen now. The sooner it was destroyed, the best.
"You know," Scorpia said. Her voice drew Catra's gaze away from the softly pulsing crystal, to Scorpia's thinking face and hint of a smile. "It's hard to tell now, with what the Horde did to it, but we are on a lava field and near a volcano. When I was little, I liked to drop things in the lava flow. Most of its covered, Hordak uses it to power the facilities, but we might be able to find a crack or two if my memory is right."
Catra blinked at her.
"Want to run an experiment?" the other woman said, "See the effects of lava on a First One's data crystal?"
#####
They didn't actually find out the effects of lava on First One's data crystals. They had watched the thick lava slowly flow over it, taking it from sight, and prayed the heat and pressure melted it down. Catra wished she could be sure about its destruction. A lack of knowing made her bite her lips, absently dig her claws into her own forearm.
Scorpia dealt with Entrapta's hysterics about the missing crystal, something about a friendly rat liking it, and tried to calm her down by reminding Entrapta had a backup of the code, at least.
Catra dealt with the painful please bouncing around her chest.
#####
A loud, sharp gasp pulled Glimmer from her fitful sleep. Instantly, she sat up and turned her attention to Adora. An Adora whose pale skin slowly turned pink, whose eyelids fluttered before lifting.
"Gl'mr?"
Glimmer pressed her face into Adora's chest and sobbed.
Adora made noises of protest and Glimmer quickly pulled back. She could cry later. Adora would need medicine, water, and -
Bow stepped up. Like Glimmer, he'd been sleeping in Adora's room the past few days.
"Here," he pressed the glass of water into Glimmer's hand. "You get her to drink that. I'll get the healers."
Glimmer didn't even thank him, to focused on a fitful Adora. Gently, she lifted Adora up and then teleported behind her for support. She held the glass to Adora's lips, who eagerly drank it. "Go slow, Adora."
"Not sick," she answered, even as her hands trembled as she tried to reach for the glass.
"Yes, you are. And I'm going to take care of you. I don't care what you would have done in the Fright Zone but here...here..." Glimmer bowed her head, resting it on Adora's thin shoulder. "I want to help you. I need to help you. Please let me," she whispered.
"Okay," Adora whispered back after a moment.
Glimmer took in two deep breaths, Adora was alive Adora was alive, and then went back to helping her friend drink. She didn't step away when the healers came. Or when Adora fell asleep. Or when Bow brought her dinner they could share while Adora slept.
Much later, as Adora slept and Bow snored on the floor, Glimmer finally had the ability to pull herself away from Adora. She didn't go far, just to the window and looked east.
The words wouldn't lift off her tongue, but she made sure to form them in her mind. Thank you, Catra.
Then, Glimmer eased herself onto the bed next to Adora, curling around her friend and endlessly relieved to feel Adora snuggle closer.
