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Chapter 5: Sister Departed

Catra was having a nightmare. It was the usual one, the one she almost always had whenever she managed to win a few precious hours of sleep after first throwing that switch to the portal in the Fright Zone.

"Why did you do it?"

Adora stared at her from in front of the portal, her eyes every bit a storm as the vortex at her back. It didn't matter that Catra always anticipated this scene, and it didn't matter that she always tried to run away—knowing she was in the middle of a nightmare never seemed to make it feel less scary, and nothing she did ever changed the outcome of what inevitably happened next.

She fell.

This time, rather than fight it, Catra closed her eyes and let herself go, felt herself get swept off her feet and sucked backward into the portal behind Adora. She was eager to wake up and calm her heart she knew was hammering in her chest.

Except, the nightmare didn't end when she opened her eyes again. Instead, she found herself in a grand throne room—Horde Prime's throne room. And she was the one sitting on the throne.

"What of the program?" she heard herself ask. "That AI? The one that helped her to decipher the ancient writings."

A woman was kneeling before her, head down, wearing a military cap with a visor that obscured her face. "We didn't find anything on her," she said. "No data chips on her body, and nothing out of the ordinary with the rest of her implants—all standard issue, science-grade."

"And what of her remains?"

"C-cremated, my lord." The woman said, fists trembling at her sides. "Since she was denied military honors or a marked grave, I decided to take her with me, instead."

Anger leaked from the woman's voice and Catra felt herself grin. "It doesn't matter that her actions ended the war," Catra said. "Had she obeyed my commands from the beginning, had she furthered the research she brought to me in the first place, then many more trillions of lives would have been saved. As it stands, all she's bought us is more time. And at what cost? Outing the remainder of the Daiamid and driving them to extinction?" Catra scoffed. "Traitors don't become martyrs, they become nameless. Your sister shall be forgotten by history, and any who dare utter her name shall share her fate. You're lucky I'm not punishing you for helping her, Taline."

Taline looked up at her, and Catra finally saw her face. Rage flared in her eyes, tears streamed down her face, and Catra felt a perverse sense of glee ripple in her chest at the sight. She wanted Taline to act on that anger and give Catra the excuse she needed to put her down and humiliate her further. Retaliating now after what happened would make Catra look weak in front of her subjects, but if Taline attacked her? That would be good enough reason to pay her back a hundred times over for the humiliation she had subjected her to in the earlier battle.

Taline relaxed and looked away. "Thank you for your discretion, sir." Even though it sounded as if speaking the words made her sick, Catra couldn't help but feel disappointed she'd chosen to deescalate.

Catra gave a dismissive wave of her hand. "If that program wasn't on her person, then I'm certain a copy of it is stored on her private research servers. Who from your team is in charge of tearing apart that lab the Daiamid gave her?"

"I have Diallo en route to the planet as we speak, my lord," she said, standing.

Diallo? Now there was a man with aspirations far larger than his abilities. Catra wondered what strange force had possessed Taline to put him in charge. Thanks to her near-perfect memory recall—helped in part by the implants that allowed her full access to her clones' experiences—Catra knew almost every important subject of her empire by name. But Diallo was so unremarkable, he threatened to shake himself loose and fall between the gaps in her memory.

"Good," Catra said, preferring not to read too deeply into it. "I want a fully itemized list of his findings within a week, and I want everything in that lab brought to my personal storage facilities on Acheron Prime." She raised a finger in warning. "And don't think I won't know if something is missing, Taline. Prime knows all." Taline gave a muted 'Yes sir,' and Catra made another dismissive gesture at her. "Now get out of my sight."

Catra's mind wandered as Taline turned and headed for the exit at the far end of the throne room. In her thousands of years alive, hopping through clone bodies as they aged beyond use in a never-ending mission to conquer both death and the galaxy, her fate had always been her own to make. Now her empire tottered on the brink of collapse, and the only way to ensure its survival was to wait for the appearance of a magic planet, lost in the space between dimensions, before the barrier holding back that hell-spawn creature burst through and put an end to them for good.

That same empire had thrived for many hundreds of thousands of years because they not only had the technology to make her essentially immortal, but also had the means to shove great fleets into the void and pluck them out on the other side of the galaxy faster than the speed of light. Yet despite this, they could not locate a single, massive planet stuck within that same void and pull it through to their own reality? Why was Catra forced to wait for it to show up on its own terms instead of on hers?

She took a deep breath and smoothed the worry lines she felt cropping up on her face. The scientists had said it would be easier to locate a single person and return them from the void than it would be to locate a whole planet and do the same—something about their inability to read the energy signature of a thing that massive because of the sensitivity of their instruments. The specifics never made sense to her, but that was why she had her advisors in the first place: to deal with the specifics. In any case, although she had damned her to anonymity, Taline's blasted sister had never once been wrong about her predictions once they started coming to her, and she likely wouldn't be wrong about this one. Etheria would show, and the Enclave—Taline especially—would be on constant lookout for it.

That didn't stop Catra from feeling powerless over the fact all this was out of her hands, however. She hated that feeling. She needed to do something to return that sense of control.

"Taline?" Catra called, her voice echoing in the great sanctum and stopping her just shy of the exit. "Aren't you forgetting something?"

Taline stiffened, and Catra thought she might ignore her and walk straight through the doors. Then, she did a quick about-face, clicked her heels together, and thrust an open hand to her visor in an aggressive salute. "Hail the Horde Empire! Hail Horde Prime!"

Anguish flared anew on her face. She didn't break eye contact with Catra as she held the salute for a long five seconds. Then she stowed her salute, and marched out of the throne room. Catra listened to sound of Taline's boots echo down the hall outside, growing quieter the farther away she got. Before long, her vision faded to black…

…And she finally woke, back aboard Prime's citadel.

Her heart hammered in her chest, like she expected it to back when she first fell into the portal at the beginning of the nightmare. Her head hurt. It felt like someone took an axe to her head. Even still, Catra never thought she'd ever feel relieved to see the stars outside their window, or the halogen strip lights on the ceiling of their cell. They bathed the room in light harsh enough to make her nauseous, but at least she was herself again.

The pain in her head grew suddenly worse, and her vision blurred out. The room began to spin. It wasn't until a dull pain radiated from her knees and hands up to her hips and elbows that she realized she had fallen off the bottom bunk and caught herself on the floor.

Someone kneeled in front of her and held her by the shoulders. Catra tried to focus on their face but it was impossible to get her eyes to focus or the room to stop spinning. All she could make out through the pain was the vague pink tones of their hair.

"Glimmer?" she asked, before chastising herself in her head. Of course it was Glimmer. Who the hell else would it be? Glimmer was the only other person in this cell with her.

Catra shivered, remembering their conversation from earlier. She didn't deserve Glimmer's kindness, and part of her wish she'd withhold it and spare Catra the shame. Her vision focused enough to make out Glimmer's features, only to immediately realize that this person in front of her wasn't actually Glimmer at all.

"You don't look so good," Angella said, supporting the back of Catra's head with one hand as she swayed.

"This is another dream," Catra said, feeling panic well up inside her again. "It has to be. You aren't here. You….youcan't be here."

Angella frowned at her. "Your mind can't keep up with what happened to it. Go to sleep now. Things will be better when you wake up, I promise." Angella pressed her thumb and index finger to Catra's forehead, and she fell back into unconsciousness.

This time, there were no nightmares.

Glimmer hadn't slept. The warships outside had reminded her that someone powerful enough to make Horde Prime change course was coming for them, and that unnerved her. Catra's sudden tossing and turning and moaning in bed hadn't helped either, and Glimmer had been moments away from going to check on her when she heard loud voices and footsteps approaching from outside the cell.

The doors slid open a moment later and a woman stepped through, straight-backed, wearing a crisp military uniform. She doffed her cap, stowed it under one arm, and swept the room with a gaze of ice. Two soldiers encased head to toe in body armor joined her. A stylized faceplate covered their faces and prevented Glimmer from reading their expressions or intentions.

A thud sounded off to the side before Glimmer could properly react, and all attention turned to Catra. She had fallen off the bed and lay there spasming on her hands and knees. Glimmer yelped and rushed forward when both guards intercepted her. One of them grabbed her arm to hold her back while the other barred her path forward.

Panicking, Glimmer swung with her free hand at the one in front. Pain radiated up her arm when flesh met armor, and she cursed, yanking out of the other soldier's hold to nurse her throbbing hand.

"Please don't punch my Sentinels," the woman said. Glimmer looked over and found her cradling a now unconscious Catra in her arms, one hand supporting the back of her head while the other pressed her thumb and index finger to Catra's forehead. "I'm terrible with healing runes and, frankly, I don't have the time to send you to the medical bays either. It would be terribly inconvenient if you had to go and break your hand, not to mention painful and unnecessary."

"You're Taline," Glimmer said, leering at the Sentinels while trying to keep an eye on her. "I recognize you from when you interrupted Prime's fun with us."

"You're welcome for that, although I did find out later that he didn't stop torturing this one." Taline stood with a grimace on her face, lifting Catra bridal style between her arms. She motioned to the Sentinel closest to her—the one blocking Glimmer's path—and deposited Catra in their arms, murmuring a quick order to bring her to the infirmary.

"Don't worry," Taline said after seeing the look Glimmer gave them carrying Catra out the door. "Your friend will be ok. I just helped calm her mind somewhat. It's still processing what it went through with the Emperor. He gets…impatient when he probes a mind that isn't cloned from his own, and although Salas is proficient enough to keep him from damaging them beyond saving, there's still an adjustment period afterward, shall we say."

Glimmer narrowed her eyes at her, not entirely sure what to make of her words. "Is that your armada out there?" she asked, gesturing to the window.

"Armada?" Taline looked confused as she looked out the window too. Then gave a soft laugh. "I'd hardly call that an armada, but yes. Those are my ships."

"And what, pray tell, are you planning on doing to us? Horde Prime didn't get anything out of Catra about the Heart because she doesn't actually know anything, and neither do I. Not really."

Glimmer shut her mouth when fear started to make her voice quaver. She obviously didn't want to be the subject of another torture session, not at Horde Prime's hands nor any other. But she couldn't think of any good reason for why someone like Taline would be there in the first place if it wasn't to extract more information.

"I'm not here to do anything to you," Taline said. "I'm here because I need your help."

Glimmer blinked as if she hadn't heard her correctly. Even if she didn't trust Taline further than she could throw her, hearing that come out of her mouth was unexpected. "What exactly is it you need my help with?"

"I need you to help me convince the Emperor to leave this planet the hell alone."