Chapter 22: Good Soldiers
Teela was in trouble.
That was an understatement. She was standing at her bestest attention in the dead center of Colonel Blast's office, eyes aching dry. She'd stopped crying and that was perhaps the one good thing that had happened since she'd knocked out Roja's tooth.
She could almost hear Adam in the hallway outside, pacing like a caged animal, an anxious foil to how hard she was trying not to move at all. The Colonel was flipping through a file, her file, and nausea welled up in her stomach like a pothole filling with rainwater.
"Relax, Cadet," the words almost made her jump, "I've had nothing bad from you before today." Her shoulders slumped and she found herself almost ready to weep again, out of sheer relief this time. Blast ran a hand over his bald scalp, a look on his face almost like embarrassment.
"It's my fault you're standing here," he sighed, "it's always my fault." Teela didn't speak and the Colonel went on in her place. "I stood where you're standing…a hundred times? Two hundred? Called to account for all manner of infractions. Lying to superiors. Mouthing off to superiors. Cheating on tests. Stealing food from the mess hall." Teela tried not to squirm at that last one, especially as the Colonel fixed her with a sad smile. "Fighting outside training."
"I'm sorry," her voice was a miserable croak, her whole face burned.
"Why? You only fought back didn't you? I saw the whole thing." Teela blinked at him a few times, nearly dazed by his admission. "I could've done something like the Mess-Sergeant did but that's not my way. That's insulting to you, Cadet. To all of you." He folded his hands and leaned forward. "Every other Colonel in this place has treated you all like children. You're not children."
"Wha…" Teela put a hand over her mouth to stop the question. Colonel Blast quirked his mouth like he knew what she was going to ask anyway.
"Numbers, Cadet. You are numbers." Teela frowned. The Colonel looked her over carefully. "You like old Sgt. Vultak?"
"Um…yes, sir?"
"Everyone does," the Colonel's smile was sour now, "he treats you like kids. Thinks you need someone there to salve every bruise and tell you that you can't ever do wrong. You think that's nice, I guess, because on the other side of the problem you got Sergeants like Sgt. Coral. You like her, Cadet?"
"Ye-"
"Please don't lie to me, Teela."
"No, sir. I don't."
"She treats you like kids too. She covered herself in glory at Castle Darkspur. Cut down a dozen knights and traded a few blows with King Darkspur himself. Now what's she doing? Teaching Hordlings to hold a shield without falling over. Think she likes that?" Teela certainly didn't think about that side of things before, her daydreams never went beyond defeating the Princesses single-handed. "She got placed here at my request, because I know she's a master fighter. She thinks she's too good to train Cadets."
The silence stretched out between them until Blast spoke again.
"I hated this place," he shook his head and nodded at the window behind him, "hated everyone here. The Colonel. The Sergeants. My squad. Hated them cuz I felt like I was too small, too stupid, and too bad to learn how to be a good soldier. So, if I got beat up for it, it wasn't very fair, was it?"
Blast stood up fished out a pair ID-tags from his shirt, unlooping the beaded chain from his neck and tossed them to her. Teela snatched them out of the air. A flat oval of metal with the Colonel's name above a long number, his blood type, and the word 'Cremation'.
"When you graduate you will get a sequence of your own, Cadet. Names mean nothing when you're shipped from one front to another, transferring into new battalions, too tired to keep your eyes open when you gotta report in. My name isn't R. Blast it's 549032. Numbers, Cadet, that's what we are," his words weren't without a certain pride, "our war is a question of numbers. Which number is better," he snapped suddenly, "one or two?"
"Um, one, sir!" Teela said.
"Why?"
"Cuz it's first, sir?"
"Maybe. But two is twice as many, isn't that right?" Blast said. Teela winced. "See? Let's say I need you to take a castle. A fortress high in the Dryl Mountains." He nodded out his window in the direction of the Battlefields. "Now our scouts have found a small crag that leads right inside. Not but twenty Rebels holding it. Kill them all," he smiled, "make them zero and you're inside. You got one hundred soldiers at your command. How many do you send?" Teela chewed her lip as she tried to figure out Blast's trick.
"…not all of them…" Teela said, the Colonel gave her no help, "Half?" He squinted at her. "Fifty, sir."
"Fifty. Good round number. Why fifty?"
"Fifty to hold the road, in case of a sneak attack. Fifty is twice as many as the Rebels plus five."
"You know how many men you lose, Teela?" Her stomach bubbled again. That was another thing she never imagined when she thought about fighting. She shook her head. "It doesn't matter." Teela searched her boots for an answer. "Whatever the number you send out, they'll fight, because they're good soldiers. And good soldiers are all we have to fight the worst thing to ever blight this world."
"Magic," Teela said obediently, putting scorn into her voice.
"Magic is disordered," Blast said solemnly, "chaotic. A lot of power in one person, to exert their will over thousands more. Is that fair?"
"No, sir," Teela said. Magic was evil, if magic didn't exist, she could live a normal life. With people who liked her.
"Are you a good soldier, Teela?"
"Yes, sir." Teela said.
"I hope so," Blast smiled, "we need good soldiers." He tilted his head towards his office door. "Now as for Adam. What about him?"
"Sir?" She squirmed at last, all of this strange talk forgotten as she remembered that she was in trouble.
"He has no number," Blast said, jaw tensing, "he is not one of us. Is he a good soldier?"
"Sir?" Teela repeated, confused.
"Come on," Blast said, "you've realized by now he's not quite like the others?"
"Adam is…well," Teela said, defensive by reflex, "he's clever." And nice. And friendly. And forgiving. And a dozen other things that Teela liked even better but didn't dare repeat to the Colonel.
"Numbers, Teela," Blast tapped her file, "I've got you here, in this file, as much I've got you in front of me. That boy? He's a question mark." He spread out some papers. "Proficiency and Conduct Report: 97/100. A number. Last recorded weight lifted in Early Strength Training: Ten pounds. Three reps, five per rep. A number." He looked up at her. "Time for the 100M-Sprint in your last Spring Fitness Examination." He flipped the page over so she could see the number had been circled twice in red ink. "31.2 seconds. A record number. Numerically, I find you to be a good soldier."
"Thank you, sir," Teela pushed the hair out of her face, reminded miserably that her reward for that accomplishment had been snapped in half. Blast slipped an empty file onto the desk, scrawling a name at the top. 'Adam'. He tapped his pen against the desk, clicking the steel tip in and out of sight.
"I've got something arranged with his owner," Blast said, "and if I'm right, which I know I am, he might just get his own number someday. After I've made sure he's up to the standard." He pointed his pen at her. "Teela, you currently have no infractions worthy of my attention. None. Zero. I'd really rather not change that number, but it falls on you to help me here."
Teela didn't understand what she was being asked or, perhaps, she didn't want to. If she'd just kept her head down, if she'd just been a good soldier nothing would've happened.
"Now who started that fight, down there? Roja jumped you, I saw that. But I get the feeling something boiled over today, and your thirteenth Cadet was involved somehow. Just tell me what I need to hear, Cadet Teela." Teela froze.
"I-I did, sir."
"Are you sure?" Blast's eyes narrowed at her. "Sure you're not miss remembering? Good soldiers tell the truth Teela. You only get so many chances to prove that to me. So think carefully."
Teela gave her answer.
"Klawdeen?" Catra read the little metal tag. Nimble purple fingers plucked it from her hands. "What? You left it out on your desk…"
"Hmmph," Vultak pocketed the object, "that makes it your business does it?" He eased himself into his chair. "So, that kid of yours, there a reason he seems like he's picking up basic concepts as he goes along?" Vultak had plenty of experience teaching kids, she could mine a few tips from him.
"Adam showed up wearing-"
"A purple hide tunic. Teeth for buttons?" Catra's surprise must've been visible, Vultak gave a mirthful, cawing laugh. "Pure chance? Lucky guess? Maybe I'm a mind-reader!" Catra rolled her eyes and hopped onto the first of the Cadet tables, crossing her legs.
"He was filthy," she said, "like 'never in the same country as soap'. Skin and bones too. Hardly knew what anything was." Catra frowned as she remembered that difficult first night. How she'd hit him.
'An open-hand slap. Nothing to make noise over.' That was what that cruel, one-eared Sergeant had said.
"Looks pretty good," she looked up at Vultak's words, "all things considered. Blends right in with the other Cadets. Well, almost blends in."
"I get it," Catra groaned, "I'm trying to teach him discipline. He's too soft."
"Soft?" Vultak pulled out the metal disc again, rubbing his thumb over it. "No. Not what I saw. Friendly, maybe." Catra snorted at the understatement. "But soft? No. There's barbed wire in that boy. He was raised mean."
"'Raised mean'," Catra leaned back on her palms, stretching until her back cracked a little, "who isn't 'raised mean' around here? Colonel Blast seems like he-"
"Uh-uh," the old man said, "not at all. 'Raised mean' is a lot less pleasant than what we got here. Not that this is a midday patrol in Horde Square by any means." Vultak's broken wing twitched. "There are places worse than the Fright Zone, Force Captain." His small eyes locked with hers, aged by untold trials. "Places peopled by cruel things that don't give you even the first chance." He adjusted his seat, cringing at the pain in his legs.
"Like where?"
"You don't want to know," Catra's tail lashed the air in annoyance, "but Adam, wherever he's from, grew up somewhere any day could be his last. I can see it on him. You learn to recognize the signs." His dour face cracked with a smile. "But seems someone has given him a reason to think the big, bad world ain't so scary."
"I'm not doing this cuz I like him hanging around," she said, her ears pulled back, face heating up, "he owes me a few favors"
"Favors?" Vultak chuckled. She did not come here to be laughed at.
"I saved his life," Catra snarled, Vultak looked up, "yeah, me! Scrawny little Catra. I kept Lord Hordak from killing him. He owes me and I'm close to getting what I'm owed. By Spring we'll be in Brightmoon. Just a few obstacles, that's all."
"Basic education for instance?" Vultak shook his head. "He's gonna have a time catching up. And even if he does, he's a long way from going toe-to-toe with a Princess." Catra examined her claws as he'd not spoken. "I mean that's your plan, right? Magic against magic." Vultak took a deep breath. "It won't work." Catra hopped off the table and onto her feet.
"What would you know?"
"Thought out all the angles, have you? Air-tight, is it? It won't work the way you think it will, Catra, it can't. And maybe it shouldn't." Vultak's face wrinkled more than normal. "By Spring, says you? A ten-year-old can't win a war, says I. The battlefield is no place for a child."
"Even one 'raised mean'," Catra said. Vultak glared at her.
"Especially," he said, "not that you'd get that." Catra hissed, deep in the back of her mouth. "Hang on now, Force Captain, I'm don't mean that you had it easy."
"I'll freaking say!" Catra slammed her palms onto Vultak's desk. "I've got actual plans unlike the idiots wasting their time here. Or the ones who like punching children all day long."
"As one of those idiots," Vultak didn't back down, "let me say that not everybody here is out to beat on the Cadets-"
"Oh, like that matters at all!" Faster, spryer than she could've believed, the ancient-of-war shot up from his chair, yellow teeth bared.
"Then come down here and change things!" Catra backed away, startled by the sight of the man in a pure rage. "You are a Force Captain, Catra, do something with it! You got Hordak's ear? Do something!" Shadow Weaver's hatred, Colonel Blast's disgust, they'd been worse, but she'd expected their hostility. Vultak's sudden fury chilled her a little, made her feel small. "Whatever you gotta say I guarantee I've said it to myself!" Vultak slumped into his chair, an old man all over again.
"I'm so tired," he croaked, "Catra, I don't know how much time I got left and I'm scared for these kids. No volunteers no more. All we get are the leavings of the war to train them. Bitter, angry folks who'd rather be anywhere else. We're fighting on so many fronts. Stretched across a dozen battlefields…" He rubbed the edges of his eyes. "Wasn't always like this."
"It was for me," Catra said. Vultak could only nod.
"You know, back at the start it was different," he sighed, "in the beginning Hordak took in a thousand outcasts with nowhere to go."
"Real generous of him," Catra scoffed. Vultak surprised her with a laugh.
"Sharp," he said, "you've always been sharp, kid." Catra drew herself back, less in the old man's space. "No, not generosity. But the chance to show up and build a whole new kingdom? That's something exiles, criminals, and a never-was like me would've killed for…" his face fell "…did kill for. Told ourselves it was alright in the end. Someone wins, means someone else has to lose, right? The Scorpioni lost."
"These were the good ol' days you're looking so miserable over, Sarge?" Catra found herself listening, slightly fascinated by the idea of the Fright Zone before her time. It seemed unreal, implausible almost.
"Curse of hindsight," Vultak said, "back then this Academy wasn't even a thought. This was all some dusty marketplace. A whole bunch of us were bivouacked here, it was nothing but rocks and sand." Vultak leaned back in his chair. "All of us gossiping like kids at a sleepover. Couldn't believe we got a chance to live somewhere the guy next to you wasn't waiting to steal your shoes after you fell asleep." Vultak glanced down at his talons and Catra's feet. "Not that you and I ever had that problem I guess."
"So that's how the Horde got started," Catra tilted her head, "they just tell us it all sprang up out of the ground when Hordak…'convinced' the old King to submit to his rule."
"The music, the languages you'd hear. The smells at dinnertime, First Ones, you kids have no idea what real food tastes like." Vultak sighed. "Even Lord Hordak himself was kinder back then. I met him a few times in my life, though I doubt he'd remember."
"Hordak was kinder? Sure, that's not you getting senile?"
"Maybe 'easier to approach' is more accurate. He'd walked among us back then, learning everything he could about Etheria. Fought alongside us." Catra's eyebrows shot upwards. "Yeah. He was deadly on the frontline, our Lord. He dueled Haradra, the last Champion of Scorpion Hill. They fought for four straight hours before the end, we all thought he'd die from her venom, but he pulled through." He laughed. "Even saw him smile. Like he hardly believed he could get it done. Like he was proving something to himself."
"So, what happened to him?"
"My theory is age, or whatever comes close to it for…whatever he is," his eyes crept to the window, and the distant skyline of the inner Fright Zone, "never met a single creature like him in all my travels. And I traveled more than most. I think the Supreme Lord of the Fright Zone might be one-of-a-kind. And I think he feels something like mortality creeping up on him though he doesn't quite show it. Time, Catra, will wrestle you to the ground and keep you there."
"Not me," she sniffed, "I'm gonna stay young forever and never die." Vultak scoffed and Catra let herself smile.
"Way back when I was your eternally youthful age, Force Captain, I thought like you did. Big plans, big ideas. Eyes on the top of the pyramid, as it were. Don't quite know why I wanted that back then. I just did. It seemed like what everyone was supposed to want."
"Yeah," Catra frowned, "well, I want to win this war."
"Alright, alright, keep your fur on," Vultak said, "anyway there was this old network of dead-end, dried-up mines in the North-Western Canyons. Gone now. Gone a long time. But I got this wild idea to gather about every nasty creature I could find and pen them up in there. To use for our future battles." He looked over the tag in his hands, smiling sadly. "Hordak agreed. Gave some punk kid a chance to prove himself. Those beasts were beautiful. Kulwats. Giant, shaggy bullocks could crush you at full charge. White Fangs from Green Island, deadly in a pack, eyes like molten gold. A mantisaur," he chuckled, thin and high, "I wanted to train it so Lord Hordak could ride the big bug. How's that for an idea?"
He tossed Catra the tag. She caught it and looked over the name on it again.
"Klawdeen," he said, "she was the crown jewel. My greatest challenge. The last Panthor on Etheria." Vultak leaned back in his chair, gnarled fingers crossing on his chest. "Chased folklore and rumor all the way into the muggiest, bloodiest jungles in Serenia. Found her just in time. Her parents had turned nasty, as those big cats tended to, ripped each other apart for no good reason. She was wandering around, little violet cub, crying out for help. So vulnerable." Vultak gave Catra a knowing look. "But she grew. Size of a horse at her biggest. Claws that could tear a drone in half." Vultak chuckled darkly, his eyes flickering like the embers of a dying fire. "And what a temper she had. What a bad-tempered girl she was. My Klawdeen."
"I'm waiting for the cautionary part of your tale." Catra yawned dramatically.
"She killed them." Catra flinched, Vultak was staring at his desk, mind far away in time.
"Killed who? Why?"
"I packed those caves with the meanest specimens of the most dangerous creatures on this planet. Klawdeen broke free one night and…there wasn't even a sound. She worked quiet. Ate her way through everything I captured until she couldn't stomach no-more and she skragged the rest of 'em just cuz that was her instinct. Lord Hordak called me into his old headquarters in Horror Hall and I expected to end that day minus everything above my shoulders."
"Obviously you lived."
"My third and final chance," Vultak said, "you've met him?" Catra nodded. "Promise to clean up your own mess and you can just about wriggle free of a death sentence." Vultak reached into a drawer, drew out a long white dagger. Catra shook her head and leaned forward to get a better look. Her mouth fell open as she realized it was a single curving claw, nearly a foot in length. She curled her hands inwards, slightly ashamed of how dangerous she thought her own claws to be.
"H-how did you do it?" She was incredulous. If Vultak said he hadn't and that Catra was, in fact, talking to his ghost she might believe it. The size of the monster that claw came from was beyond anything she'd yet encountered. Vultak lifted the yellowed claw high and ran the tip across his thin gizzard.
"Someone said we should just seal the caves, let her starve." His eyes narrowed. "No, ma'am, that wasn't happening if I could stop it. I went in there fully prepared never to come back out. Had to try. Had to be there for it if I could be." He spun the claw around, driving the point deep into the surface of his desk. Still sharp after four decades. "She didn't even growl at me. See, she knew I'd never hurt her. She knew I loved her." The fire in his eyes guttered out and he put the claw away, held out his hand for the tag. "That's how the last Panthor ever to walk this planet ended her life. Killed by the fool who should've left her alone."
Catra dropped the tag into his palm, afraid to let their hands touch out a strange revulsion for the old man. She backed away, trying to appear lazy and uninterested.
"And you think that's how my plan is gonna end?"
Vultak's eyes searched her face desperately. "It could. Never think it can't."
"Thanks for the advice, Sarge, but I can handle it."
"Can you?" Vultak asked. "I seem to recall a magicat cub who scarred a Cadet's arm for trying to shove her best friend. Judging by the broken coffee maker I'd say your temper hasn't improved."
"If you even remember," Catra spat, suddenly angry, "that was years ago. Adam and I have a deal."
"Kids don't owe people things they can't understand," Vultak said, "it's a cruel person who makes them feel otherwise." Icy rage numbed her stomach. "There was that other time when you kids were-"
"Shut it!" Catra surprised him, and herself, with her volume. "Adora turned traitor. Deserted. Turncoat! Get it? She isn't my friend." Vultak took a deep breath like she was the one driving him up a wall.
"I heard about it -"
"I live it. Whatever life-story you got for that you can keep to yourself." Catra scorned the room with a harsh glare. "You think any of this 'kindly old sergeant' stuff matters? It doesn't. Cuz outside this room we went right back into a nightmare." Vultak's fist shook around Klawdeen's tag. "As for your pet monster? You got her killed because you overestimated yourself. I'm not making that mistake." Someone rapped at the door to the room, startling a growl from her.
"Sergeant Vultak? Sarge? It's Logen!" The old man straightened in his chair, face disciplined.
"It's unlocked, Logen." A nine-fingered human wearing an apron stepped into the room.
"Sir…Colonel Blast is up to something. He's taking a group of Cadets down to the Battlefield."
"What else is new?" Catra groused.
"Not again." Vultak sighed. "He's been real hard on the last-years this week, but maybe I can talk some sense into-"
"It's not that, sir," Logen said, "they're just little ones. Ten-years-old maybe. Something's gotta be done, Sarge. The lads in the Mess are fit to mutiny over it." He kicked the door, teeth bared. "I can't blame them. This is beyond wrong; he'll get one of them killed at this rate."
"Could be he's just trying to scare them with the threat," Vultak creaked out of his chair, sounding more desperate than certain, "I'll get over there and have a word just in case."
"What Squad number?" Catra asked, her tail frizzing up, stomach tightening as she waited for an answer she knew.
"Eh? Um. I think it was something like eighty-ooof!" Logen slammed into the wall as she shoved past him. When Catra hit the stairwell, she vaulted the first railing and fell from one landing to the next to reach the ground floor in under a minute.
Why did you think he'd deal honestly? She berated herself. You idiot! She was running on two legs than on all fours, taking the turf field in huge bounds. She'd forgotten how much easier it was to move like this, the Sergeants had tried to bully the instinct out of her when she was little. Marching, not running like an animal, was what good soldiers did.
Catra had tried to be a good soldier. She'd tried as hard as she could, but it simply never worked. Because when she stopped running on all fours, she was too slow. When she tried to wear helmets like they told her, her vision shrank. When she tried to stay in line, follow orders, and pretend she couldn't see how wrong it all was her insides twisted into terrible, pained shapes that made her want to scream.
She hated this place and she'd brought Adam here, exposed him to emptiness, to falseness and worst of all to the cruelty.
If you put one hand on him!
The Battlefield grew taller as she approached, the hill of mud and rocks becoming the imposing slope of fortified mountain. The looming square bunker atop flew the captured standard of an old Rebel division that hung limp in the still, humid air. A semicircle of children stood at attention as Colonel Blast declaimed.
A child stood alone at his side; head bowed in misery.
"…understand perfectly what being part of a unit is," he was saying, face twisted up in anger, "so we're just going to see how this goes and maybe we can-"
"Hey!" Catra skidded to a halt, clapped the gravel from her palms and curled her fingers back to hide her unsheathed claws. "Guess I didn't make my rules clear enough for you."
Blast's face twitched once before the burn scars by his mouth shifted with his triumphant smile.
"Cadets," he said, "there is an officer present." The kids looked at her, confused by her youth, then one of them shot forward and snatched her right hand desperately.
"Catra!" Adam's face was pinched with concern. "Help!"
"Wait…" Catra turned her head towards the Cadet standing next to Blast. Red hair, hazel eyes, and sharp little eyebrows that gave her a look like she was challenging the whole world. The girl's eyes flicked down to Catra's belts and she went to attention at once.
"F-Fff," she was flustered but managed a salute, "Force Captain!" Her squadmates leaned forward, tiny sounds of wonder escaping them as they scrambled to show respect.
"Who the-?"
"Teela," Adam said, yanking Catra forward, "Catra, help!" Catra regained her composure and reclaimed her hand.
"Hang on," she said to him, "what's this about?" Adam shuffled backwards to stand next to the girl. The girl broke her salute to move Adam away with a gentle shove that held an urgency Catra recognize from her own childhood. Don't get us into more trouble.
"Adam, I told you to stay in line," the girl growled out through the side of her mouth, "and salute!" She nodded at Catra significantly.
"Oh, like it matters," Catra said, "who are you? What is all this?"
"Ma'am-"
"Don't call me that."
"Force Captain-"
"Catra!" Adam whined, bouncing on the soles of his boots, eyes darting as he tried to find the right way to explain himself. "Teela…"
"My name is Teela and I'm going to run the Battlefield, Force Captain!" Catra snorted at first, then after a moment of icy realization, squinted down at the girl.
"What'd you do?" The grim determination in the girl's face slipped to show the fear underneath.
"I was disobedient, Force Captain." Adam tugged at Catra's crisscrossed belts and Teela scowled at him. "Adam."
"It's fine," Catra shooed the blonde-haired child, "Adam, take a few steps back, I got this." He pouted even as he obeyed. "And you can stop saluting. And breathe, for goodness sake."
"Sorry," the redhead wheezed, "I've never met a Force Captain, Force Captain."
"I'll disappoint you," Catra said, "what's your run?"
"My…run?"
This girl is doomed. Catra felt a strange reluctance to snark over it. There simply wasn't anything funny about this situation.
"What do you have to do?"
"Uh, bring back the Rebel flag, Force Captain," Teela puffed herself up again, "and that's just what I'll do!" Catra's tail flicked in a metronome sequence as she looked between the girl, the high muddy hill, the squat fortress, and the grim face of Colonel Blast.
"He's setting you up to lose," Catra said, keeping her voice down, "and to get hurt."
"I have my orders," she said, trying to act grown-up in the way kids did that emphasized their age, "and I'll follow them." Catra pinched the bridge of her nose.
"Why am I even bothering?" She turned on her heel to leave. "C'mon, Adam, we're outta here."
"Going off campus before instruction ends is a heavy violation of the rules," a smile slithered onto Blast's face. "His day's not over yet."
"Whatever this is," Catra jabbed her thumb back at the lonely girl, "I'm not interested. I think Adam's proved himself at this point. So, if some other Hordeling get herself in trouble-"
"He started a fight. Cadet Teela decided to cover for him. So, now I'm showing her what happens to a Cadet who thinks she can choose her friend over the good of her squad. She can tackle the Battlefield alone and see how far she gets without back-up."
Colonel Blast nodded towards a pair of kids bearing recent bruises. One, a snake-clan girl with red scales, looked a little woozy, and had wad of cotton bulging under her lip where a fang was absent. Catra's eye twitched.
"Adam," she growled, she jabbed a claw at the ground in front of her, "come here." He obeyed, of course, but he shrank back slightly at whatever look her simmering anger had contorted onto her face. "'Be good'?" Adam winced. "Yeah, kid, remember that conversation we had early in scarface's office?" Someone in the crowd of Cadets gasped audibly at her blatant disrespect to the Colonel.
Adam twisted his mouth into a few shapes, refusing to look Catra directly in the eye. Each time he looked somewhere else she slunk into his line of view and locked eyes with him.
"Adam?" Her lips twitched to reveal a fang. "I am waiting for an answer here."
"S..sssorry?" His eyes went to his boots. Catra let air hiss between her teeth and knelt down to his level. "Ss-sssorry-"
"What does that do to help with this?!" Catra grabbed the injured Cadet by her shirt and wrenched her over. A green-skinned boy made a protesting noise and whimpered when Catra glanced his way. She dragged the girl forward. "Adam? This? Fix this?" The girl wriggled, yellow eyes suddenly awake with fear.
"C-catra," Adam swallowed, eyes on the girl and concerned, "stop!"
"No," Catra snapped, "no-no-no. This doesn't work if you try to give me orders. You listen to me. Adam listens to Catra!"
"Oo-k!" He would not stop looking at the squirming girl. "Ok! Stop!"
""How," she whispered, "stupid are you?" Adam frowned, his little voice making a hissing sound.
"Sss..ssttt…stu-"
"Stupid!" He jumped. "Sssssss-t-oooo-pid!" Catra's fur was standing on end. Everything she went through to get this kid here, to this moment, alive, fed, and breathing. Everything. All of it going to waste because he could behave."It means you don't do what I tell you! You don't listen!" She grabbed at her own ear, wincing as she tugged it too hard, and shook her head so much that her mane shadowed the edges of her eyes. "Adam. Listen. No!" She shoved the girl back into line.
"Ca-"
"Shhhh," she hissed, "go." Adam took a few steps in the direction of the main campus and Catra bit back a scream of anger when she heard his boots stop. "What?"
"T…T-t," his stutter wasn't from the word this time, "Teela?"
"Do you know what's gonna happen to you?" Catra asked the sky. "When the spring offensive starts, and you can't even spell your own name?" She stood up and did her best not to lean down into the boy's face. "You. Are. Dead."
"D-d..d..?" Catra dragged a claw across her throat and Adam's eyes went wide. "…Catra?"
"I ask you to do one thing," she held up a finger a few inches from his nose, "one thing, Adam! I ask you to 'be good' for a few hours and look where we are now!" She threw her arms out to either side. "You blew my deal! You knocked out some kid's tooth! And you got her in trouble!" Adam glanced at Teela and looked almost ready to weep. "No, take a look! She's gonna go up there and get hurt because you," she snarled the word, "couldn't do what I told you! That is what 'stupid' means!"
Someone kicked her in the back of the knee, and she squeaked, her arms flailed outwards, but her normally perfect balance was upset when her right ankle got swept by a solid boot. Her teeth clicked as the back of her head bounced off the ground. Somewhere under the pain was an odd sensation of déjà vu.
"Cadet," Blast's voice was soft with disbelief, but slowly, as he spoke it hardened, "I must be seeing things. Because I know I didn't just see you attack an officer." Carta sat up, blinking stupidly around at the wide-eyed children. Adam touched her face gently.
"Catra, ok?" His eyes were all concern.
I yelled at him. She thought. I called him stupid in front of all these kids. He waved his hand in front of her face. He's trying so hard…
"I hurt Roja," she heard a huffing voice declare, "I hurt Avery. I hurt Adam when he tried to stop me." Catra looked over her shoulder. Teela swallowed heavily, at once defiant while jittering with the shock of her own actions. "And…and Adam didn't do anything. So, you stop picking on him!" She straightened up. "Force Captain."
"Teela," Adam said, sounding exhausted himself.
"She was being mean to you," Teela said, "and if she thinks the Colonel is right…" her face reddened briefly and then shouted, "…then she's the stupid one!"
"Cadet!" Blast thundered. Teela screwed her eyes shut, but never once dropped her stance. "You start making your way up that hill."
"Sir," her voice cracked, "yes, sir!" And in her head, Catra could tell, Teela was thinking to herself: you idiot.
"You idiot," Catra spat into the mud, her arms were burning.
"Don't talk," Adora hissed, "keep your breath." She shouted. "Fifty-seven for Lord Hordak!" Blast's boots shifted on their backs.
"You always gotta play hero," Catra's muscles tensed, trembled.
"You can do it," Adora breathed, "c'mon. You can do it. I know you can do it, Catra. C'mon. You got it. Just a few more..."
"Catra?" Adam asked softly. Teela was staring up at the faux fortress high on the muddy hill. Blast had taken a position inside a nearby trailer, watching through an observation window, the squad of Cadets clustered about the outside in front of several large monitors.
Teela was limbering up slowly, looking ridiculously little as she rolled her shoulders.
"She's your friend. She was looking out for you."
"Ah?" Catra snorted at that. "Catra?"
"Wait here," she said, "Catra." She nodded towards Teela. "Catra help." Adam's eyes brightened and he squeezed her hand, bouncing with happiness. "Alright, don't start celebrating yet." She took a few steps away, stopping and looking back at his earnest, trusting face.
"Hey," she cleared her throat, "um…I…"
'I'll never say sorry to anybody! Ever!'
Catra forced down the sour taste of the apology. She hadn't meant to yell after all. She was tired. Worn out. She hated this place and it was a mistake. Adam understood.
"Hmmm?" Adam cocked his head.
"Stay here," she said, smiling thinly. "Stay."
"O-k," Adam huffed, "go, please. Teela…"
"What did this girl do to get your loyalty anyway?" Catra scoffed. "When we met, I saved you from a fear-elemental and I get grief. But redhead shoves me onto my butt, and you can't stop talking about how cool-"
"Catra!"
"Fine, I'm going!" She went to the trailer first and rapped obnoxiously on the observation window. Blast scowled at her but she settled for pointing to the red haired Cadet. "I'm going help her get some gear, so she'd doesn't get her head bashed open. Cuz I'm not a sadist like you. If you've got a problem with that, I don't care." She turned away before he could make any kind of denial.
Teela was in trouble. That was an understatement. She'd shoved a Force Captain onto the ground and called her stupid.
Teela was probably, definitely, absolutely going to Beast Island. And maybe that wasn't so bad. Maybe all the Pookahs and Terrorsaurs would leave her alone because she was too small and stringy to eat. Maybe she could live in a cave somewhere. Maybe she could roll a big rock in front of it and never have to face the world ever again.
Because Teela wasn't just in trouble, she was also very tired.
She'd ruined her whole life in one measly little day. Not even a day. The early morning felt like it was forever ago but if it hadn't been for that stupid, mean note someone left her…
But they were right. She sniffed suddenly. No one likes me. That was how she'd ended up in this situation, after all. And why should they? She was mean. She knocked Roja's tooth out and broke Avery's glasses.
"Hmm," there was something in her throat. Bad luck, that, she had something in her eyes too. She couldn't catch a break, could she. And maybe she didn't deserve to. She'd hurt her squadmates, like the Mess Sergeant had said, and worst of all she hurt Adam and that meant Adam probably hated her now.
No one liked her. She couldn't blame them.
After all, Teela didn't even really much like herself.
"Hey, kid." Oh, good. The Force Captain would kill her before anybody could see her cry again. There was that at least. The hand that settled on her back was gentler than she expected. "I know you're not about to start blubbering, right?"
"No," Teela said, in a watery voice.
"I didn't think so," the Force Captain rubbed her shoulder in a little circle, "you better not after calling me out like that. I don't get blindsided by crybabies and you blindsided me. So, you're no crybaby. Are you?"
"No. I'm not."
"You need gear if you're gonna get that flag," she squeezed Teela's shoulder, "follow me, red." Teela did what a good soldier would do and obeyed. Despite the ice in her belly and the snake coiling in her brain, she couldn't help being curious about the Force Captain. She didn't look all that old and she wasn't all ripped up with scars like Force Captain Octavia.
That mask-crown-thing she was wearing looked an awful lot like the pointy, red armor the Scorpioni used to wear. Teela remembered a Sergeant showing off a few dented pieces like it to her squad one time. The Force Captain must've gotten hers from the ruins around Horror Hall. And that meant she was fearless because everyone knew the old ruins were haunted.
"Did not miss this place," the Force Captain grumbled as they arrived at the long, concrete equipment shed. The walls were hung with armor and weapons. The blades had a deadly real weight to them and the helmets a black, chitinous sheen. The war gear of a real solider.
"Maybe if you were taller and wider," the Force Captain said, "over here, red." Teela stumbled on the floor as she approached, frowning despite her stomach-churning worry when she was steered away from the weapon racks. "You're little."
"But I like swords," she said, staring at a half-hander with a shiny, green blade.
"Swords?" The Force Captain had a harsh, sad-sounding laugh. "Oh, kid, a sword is not gonna help you on that hill." A clawed hand snatched a small hatchet from the gear wall. "Tell me how that feels." Teela gave a few heavy swings and the woman hissed. "Watch the tail, kid!"
"Sorry," Teela stepped back and knocked over a bundle of spears, shrieking at the loud clatter, "s-sorry!" She shook in her boots. "I'm sorry."
"He's setting you up to fail," Catra's mis-matched narrowed at Teela, "you aren't going to win." Teela took a deep breath, ready to defend herself but, somehow, the Force Captain knew her words before she said them. "And no. No, red. You won't 'show him you can do it'. You'll lose. You'll lose and that's cuz he wants you to lose. That?" She pointed at the hatchet. "That is one way to stay in the fight longer than he thinks you will. You aren't capturing a flag, red, you're trying to climb a hill."
"I…I can do it," Teela said. She jumped when the Force Captain tossed a pile of black clothing onto the floor. Knee-pads. Shoulder and elbow pads. A tight-fitting helmet liner, what her sergeants called a 'brain-saver', and a very small horde trooper helmet.
"Lucky you, they have one in your size," the Force Captain's voice went muffled as the helmet was wriggled onto Teela's head. The green visor made the mis-matched eyes look bizarre in the second before the colors corrected. "You're as ready as you can be."
"You really think I won't-"
"Look," she knelt and took Teela by the shoulders, "'think' doesn't enter into it. I know how he does things. He did this to me. It's not fair. It's not supposed to be fair. The best you can do is last longer than he wants you to. But you can't win."
Teela sagged forward a little as if deflated by the Force Captain's sheer certainty.
"I…I just…"
"I know." She looked up. "I know, kid. I've been where you are. I never stopped getting in trouble when I was your age."
"I…I haven't really been in trouble before today," Teela mumbled.
"Oh, I can tell," the Force Captain laughed, "you're as bad as…I know people who aren't used to being on the Sergeant's bad side. Colonel's bad side. Whatever." She looked Teela over. "You're staying on that hill for five minutes. Ok? Get up halfway and use that," she flicked the hatchet in Teela's hand, "to get yourself up on a rock or something. Then throw it away."
"But-"
"You wanna land on that when you fall?"
"No, Force Captain."
"Good," she patted Teela's helmet, "that's smart, red. Real smart." She paused for a minute. "You were looking out for Adam?"
"I was trying to," Teela said, "didn't do a very good job."
"Then I owe you one." Teela looked at her in wonder, but the Force Captain waved her away. "Later, kid, you've got a hill to climb." They emerged to the soft hissing sound of falling rain, or at least the facsimile of it in the form of an intricate sprinkler system. "Get moving, red, the ground's gonna get soft and your job is gonna be that much harder."
"Thank you," Teela gulped. Adam ran over to them, arms crossed over his head to keep the water out of his face. "Adam, stay here."
"Mmmm," the boy frowned at her, his concern unhidden.
"I'll be fine," Teela said, voice crackling through the helmet's speakers. The Force Captain growled, fur bristling as water settled on her mane.
"Adam, let's get under something," she snatched the boy by his shirt and drew him away.
"Bye," Adam said.
"I'll be right back," Teela said, more to herself, as she looked up the high hill towards bunker.
Help!
The Other One stirred. He was groggy. Could he be groggy? Was that possible?
Help!
"Adam?" He said. Images flashed before him. A child. Blonde hair nearly white in its fairness. A chubby little thing, barely one year old and wobbly on his legs. Eyes a soft blue, staring at the Other One curiously, sucking away at his thumb.
The child grew and thinned out into ragged, filthy creature with hair black from grime. Naked but for a purple tunic of uncured hide tied with sinews and fangs. Sleeping against the Other One's physical body, the cold steel shape of the blade, looking up at a million colorful lights winking in the night sky above the old castle.
Half-glimpsed in mirror images, like a stolen reflection, of a boy growing into his full size. Dressed in proper clothes, hair a gallant gold now, eyes bright, and face filled with life and curiosity. Worried. So worried.
Help! Yes. Help. Always. In any way he could.
"I am here," the Other One said, moving in the strange space, the old space, the space where he'd been born. "I am here. I will protect you."
You will protect him. A woman with a falcon's head, her hands tracing over his body, the nails scraping along his steel, forming him into a mind, a sharp mind, an essence that could exist where before there was only the Power.
Help!
The Other One touched the great doors that were not doors, felt the heat behind them like a roaring inferno waiting to burst free.
A tremor from beyond and ripple of blue light. In it, the Other One felt a cacophony of furious voices. Human and inhuman. Screaming in rage, howling in grief, begging for their lives, pleading to die, and all mixed up with laughter, with silences, with birth cries, with death rattles. Lives and lives and lives all roiling inside the blue magma.
Inside the Power.
He had opened the door fully once before and knew what was within. He remembered the effort it took to close it. Straining with all his infinite might to keep it sealed, muscles quivering whenever he must admit even a slithering whisper of the Power.
If the door opened again…if the Power took hold of him…no. Better, safer to wait. Wait for lightning or magic, some external source. The Power was too much. Too much for the Other One to defend against.
"I am sorry," he said to Adam.
Teela! Adam thought at the Other One.
No. I cannot help her.
Adam growled in the back of his throat, tugging forward against Catra's claws where they tangled in his stretchy shirt.
"Adam," she hissed, "this is the only way this can work! It's…I wish it was different."
Teela took off at a run, stalling nearly as soon the hill inclined, to slide down on her belly. Grasping at the loose rocks and dirt, uniform turning black. She dragged herself to her feet and half-ran at a crouch, bending like animal to give herself all fours to maneuver.
Didn't she know those silly boots and gloves were just getting in her way? A huge bubbling glug sounded from the steel drum nearby and the odd not-rain turned into a downpour.
"No!" Adam saw Teela jolt at the sudden slap of the cold water and go flat on her belly, then slide backwards almost all the way to the start. He lurched forward and Catra grabbed his shoulders. "Teela!"
"Adam!" Catra snarled at him. "You have to listen to me. Listen!" She winced as she grabbed her own ear a little too hard. "She's on her own."
She must face this alone. The Other One said.
"Rrrrraggh!" Teela winced as her own voice made her ears ring, then yelped as she sat down hard at the bottom of the hill. It hurt much worse than she expected, and she kicked her heels to make long ruts in the mud. She sputtered indignation, tossed a handful of earth at the sky.
"It's not fair!" She broke off into a long shuddering breath but refused to cry. Five little minutes. She just had to get up there and stay for five minutes. She could do that at least. Even if she knew the best way up a hill like this was in a group, fully equipped, going hand to hand up the side. Slow work but steady, last person on the bottom made the barrier against falling, first person to the top found the way. Teela was alone.
"Not fair…" she said under her breath as she tried to climb again, rainwater slid down her back, slimy and freezing. "Not fair. Not fair!" She grabbed at a rock with her gauntleted fingers, then unslung the hatchet from her belt. It was awfully heavy now that she had to use one hand. She barely managed to swing it up to slot around the rock. "C'mon…c'mon!"
She whined at the way her shoulders burned but she pulled herself up high enough to squat on the rock, her right foot hanging halfway off the side and already going numb from the position. Lucky she was little, or she'd never fit. She glared at the bottom of the hill, a scant few feet away.
Five minutes. She thought. Stay here for five minutes. The rain fell in sheets that hit so hard they hurt and she crumpled into a shivering ball. She missed her her cot. She'd let someone leave mean notes to her every morning if she could just get back there and sleep for a day.
"It's not fair," she mumbled. She told the truth. The whole, absolute truth. Like a good soldier. She huddled against the muddy hill, miserable, and waited for five minutes to pass. Underneath her, the rock shifted suddenly.
"Nooooo," she groaned, trying to move and not move all at once, "no!" The rock slid out from under her, she hurled the hatchet away as she'd been told and slid all the way down to the bottom of the hill. The level ground met her feet with another jarring thud and Teela didn't have the energy to stand up, let alone act tough.
"Not fair." She let her shoulders sag.
"Just get up and go tell him you can't do it," Catra sighed. Adam took a step forward and Catra felt her patience wearing thin. "Adam, you want her to get in more trouble?"
"Teela," he said, head never turning from where his friend sat slumped, soaked, and more defeated than Catra had ever seen anybody outside a mirror. Catra shook her head and let him go. He whipped his head around at her, confused.
"Just go," Catra rubbed at her face, beyond tired, "just go and help her stand up."
"U-up?"
"Up," Catra mimed a lifting motion, "go help Teela up." Adam grinned at her and nodded. He threw both his skinny arms over his head but otherwise splashed through the muddy ground ahead with not a care in the world. "At least you're loyal."
"Not fair," Teela said for the hundredth time. She should get up. The cold was seeping into her legs from sitting in the mud. If only she had any reason to bother.
She was a failure. A joke. She'd blown all her hard work for nothing, and it got her nowhere. She tried so hard to be the best at things and here she was, muddy and stupid and miserable.
And alone.
Always alone.
"Hey!" Adam skidded to a halt in front of her, hair a whole shade darker from the rain but smiling bright as daybreak. "Teela, up!"
"Huh?" Teela looked up.
"Up!"
"Up?" Adam leaned forward and grabbed her hands in his own.
"Up!" He said, rising and trying to bring her with him, she tugged back, her temper flaring.
"Adam, get out of here. Leave me alone!" She twisted away and ended up digging her elbow deep into the mud. "Ugh, gross! See what you made me do?" Her face was red hot under her helmet, embarrassed by his concern. "I'm trying to keep you out of trouble!"
"Up!" Adam reached out for her, and she shoved him.
"I said 'no'!" Adam stumbled backwards. Teela's anger vanished and icy dread took its place. Adam was trying to help her. She was being awful to him again. "I…Adam, I didn't mean…"
He hated her. He had to. How couldn't he? Adam hopped to his feet, shook his wet hair like a dog, and crouched to help her up.
"Teela," he said firmly, "up!"
"Ok," Teela said, "ok, fine. I'll get up." She offered her hands meekly. "I'm sorry about shoving you."
"Up," Adam grunted as he helped her stand, beaming against the downpour, "Teela!"
"Yeah, great work," she mumbled, "now we're both soaked and muddy. But…what are you doing?" Adam had begun to wriggle out of his standard issue Cadet shirt, baring his skinny torso to the cold rain with a yip of surprise. "Adam?"
He folded the shirt around and popped it back over his head to form a rudimentary hood. He tucked his blonde hair behind it and fiddled with the hem so it kept the worst of rain from getting in his eyes.
"Up!" He chirped, slapping one hand on his bare chest. "Adam help Teela."
"By taking your shirt…and now your boots off?" Teela frowned as he sat in the mud and worked off either boot, flexing his toes with a happy sigh. "You are so weird, Adam."
"Ah!" Adam pulled a face so silly when he stood up barefoot in the mud that Teela couldn't help giggling at him.
"Duh," she said, "that's what happens when you take off your clothes in the middle of a rainstorm." She quieted and shook her head at him. "Adam, you're gonna get in trouble if you hang out here. So just…get dressed and go away. You're really nice and stuff but…but good soldiers don't need help."
"Up!" He said.
"I am 'up'," Teela frowned, "are you listening to me…how in the world?!"
In the few seconds she'd been looking away he had moved to a small rock a few feet above her, crouched low against the hill like he'd done it a thousand times. He waved her up and then, face set with concentration began to press at the soil and rocks ahead.
"You…you can't climb up like that," Teela said, too bewildered to think of anything smarter to say, "that's not how we're supposed to-"
"Ha!" He swung himself up another two feet after finding secure places to hold onto, his leg kicked once as it touched the muddy hillside, but his toes gripped at the dirt like a second pair of hands. He scuttled onto a big rock and looked back at her. He scrunched up his face like she was the weird one and gestured again.
"Teela? Up!"
"This is not what I meant!" The Force Captain appeared next to Teela, soaked mane flat against her head as she squinted against the rain. "So not what I meant! And why did you take your clothes off?!" Adam had broken the rules to help her.
"After all that?" Teela said to herself. "You got in trouble anyway?"
For me? That wasn't something anyone had ever done before.
"Catra!" He waved at her. "Hi!"
"Down!" She shouted back.
"Teela, up!"
He still wouldn't listen.
"Adam, down!" The Force Captain yelled back.
"Adam help-"
"Catra not messing around!" The Force Captain's fur tried to puff up in the heavy rain. "So, get your butt down here! You can't climb this hill like this anyway." Adam's face showed his confliction and it sent a renewed strength into Teela's limbs. He believed in her and she wouldn't dare let him down.
"Adam, stay there!" Teela said. Adam cocked his head.
"Red, stay out of this!" The Force Captain gave her a withering glare that Teela met with all the defiance she could muster.
"Make me!" Teela snapped. Adam had chosen his path well enough that her first clumsy steps didn't send her sprawling. The rocks wobbled but the sucking mud refused to yield them. Adam wheeled around to climb on, digging out footholds with a quick swipe of his toes, all without any visible challenge.
"You have to teach me," Teela panted after him, yelling to be heard over the rain, "how to climb like this!" He turned to look down at her, the lip of the hill, which had seemed a million miles away moments before, peeked over his shoulder.
We're gonna do it. Her heart pounded. We're actually gonna make it! The water tank rumbled dangerously below them and the ancient water system shuddered once, breaking the rainfall for a moment, before it came vengefully back to life.
It was more a monsoon than a mountainside thunderstorm. Adam was a few feet above her, but she couldn't see a thing. She dug her fingers into the mud and held on tight.
"You're kidding me," Catra was wet down to her bones, she wouldn't be dry until tomorrow morning. The children vanished behind the gray curtains of water lashing the Battlefield. Blast was trying to flood them off the hill. "That's it. That is it!" She was going to give him the beating he'd had coming for years, and the consequences could be what they were.
"Adam! If you can hear me, just hang onto something until I stop this water!"
She unsheathed her claws and crossed her forearms against the front of her mask to better see through the downpour. The trailer was a solid shape against the trembling air, the small warm light inside of it oddly peaceful. At its far side, the squad of Cadets huddled together under a drenched and dripping canvas.
Maybe they can have a few free kicks when he's unconscious.
Catra hauled the door open to enter the small control room, dripping all over. She shoved back her drenched mane, the familiar tense excitement in her chest as she prepared to fight.
"Hey, Sarge, gotta have a word with-"
She saw the empty spot where Blast should've been the instant before lights exploded across her eyes. Her mask clanked she stumbled into the nearest wall and her wet feet squealed against the floor. A hard boot hooked around her ankle, and she was on her back gasping for air against the knee on her chest. Pure instinct made her slash at her attacker and she yowled when hands clapped around either of her wrists to jam her claws into her biceps.
"Just not your day, is it?" Her claws drew blood before she could sheathe them again and she hissed impotently in his face. "You just never learn, Catra, and that is the real tragedy here."
"The tragedy is gonna be what's left of your face!" Her threat ended in a whoofing noise as he pressed his knee into her stomach. "G-get off!"
"I was going to wait until he was here," the Colonel growled, "until I could safely say it was some kind accident or something." Catra's struggling paused, a terrible coldness racing up her spine as she saw the madness in the depths of Blast's eyes, the little twitch of nerves in his burn scars. "But some things cannot be put off. Not for the safety of our home. Of these kids."
"If you touch him," Catra gasped from the pressure on her stomach, "you die, Blast. You die slow."
"Always talk," Colonel Blast leaned in and Catra couldn't stop from whimpering, "you just don't know how to shut your mouth, Cadet." Tears pricked at her eyes and her vision blurred from the pain. "But you're one of my kids, Catra, however bad you are. And I'm doing this for you to. For all of you." The pressure vanished and Catra curled forward around her agonized stomach and trickles of blood running thinly through her wet fur on her arms. She looked up in time to see the edge of the boot swinging forward.
Adam clutched at empty air and tipped over backwards, wetter than he'd ever been in his life, to crash to against Teela's taller, armored frame.
"Ow!" He clutched at the side of his head, certain to have a new bruise there.
"A-almost there!" Teela yelled as she braced his shoulder, her glove was cold and slimy from the mud but Adam appreciated it none the less. "Come on, Adam, we can do it!"
The water was unceasing. Adam could almost imagine it was alive, aware, and angry at them for trying to climb the hill, determined to drown them off it. Handholds were harder to find now, filling with water as quickly as he could dig them out. Each time he felt the urge to give up, Teela was there, never letting him fall. She believed in him and he wouldn't let her down.
Inch by freezing, mud-soaked inch they climbed, a journey of a few steps stretching out forever. His foot slid out and his grasping fingers found no immediate purchase. He gave a perplexed grunt then a cry of delight as he let his hand rest on a flat surface.
"Ah! Teela!" He scrambled forward, nearly deliriously happy to find level ground, before spinning back around to lay on his belly. "Eep!" The ground was freezing muck against his bare skin, but Teela needed his help. He stuck his hand out into the downpour and for an instant he worried she'd fallen.
Fingers in black metal clasped tightly around his own, Adam pulled so hard he slid forward. Teela slipped backwards, teetering on the edge of a long fall lost in the heavy rain.
Help! If the Other One would just wake up and help him they'd be alright. Help! His protector was silent, and Adam's shoulder started to burn from the strain. Teela's free hand flailed at the edge of the hill before digging deep into the mud. The helmet she wore made her voice all crackly as she gave a huge yell of effort and pulled her upper body over the lip. Adam scrambled to pull her up. He grabbed at her shoulders, then at her knee as she hiked it up to the edge.
Her boot skidded a rut in the mud. Adam reached across her whole body to her side, digging his fingers into her belly. Teela gasped and suddenly, inexplicably, began to giggle.
"Ah?" Adam frowned.
"I'm-ha-ha! Fine! Hee-hee!" She struggled harder against the hill. "Just-ha!-pull!"
Of course. Now she was getting tickled. Life wasn't very fair to her, was it?
"Ah-ha-ha! Pull! A-ha-dam! Pull!" The confused boy yanked her forward, making her squeal with laughter, her right foot slipped free from the hill. The terrible resistance of gravity vanished all at once and she was breathing hard into her helmet as she lay flat on her stomach.
They'd done it.
They'd actually gone and done it.
"I…ha…ha-ha! Ha!" Adam slipped his fingers free and sat back on his palms, thin chest working to get his wind back from all their effort. He grinned sheepishly.
"Sorry," he said.
"Not that!" She was giggling, kicking her feet for the sheer joy of it. "We did it! We climbed the hill!" She leapt to her feet and yanked Adam onto his own. "We did it!"
"Tee-la!" Adam said with a tired smile. They whirled a little circle in the driving rain and splashed themselves with mud but Teela didn't care. They'd climbed the hill, whatever stupid, old Colonel Blast wanted or that surly Force Captain had said. They climbed the hill.
Together. Teela felt the stupidest urge to cry for some reason. Not even cuz she was sad or anything. She sniffled a little and pointed at the gray shape of the bunker, the thin flagpole spiking up into the blinding rain fall. Teela gasped suddenly.
The daylight seeping in past the water system had sent a rainbow arching across the Battlefield. A bridge of seven bright colors connecting earth to sky. She couldn't pull her eyes away from it, however hard she tried. She'd never seen anything like it before and was afraid she never would again.
The colors were so real. So real they looked fake. Painted or manufactured somehow, but as the light of Yudiah dimmed behind a bank of clouds, she saw the little miracle vanish, and even that filled her with awe.
"Teela?" Adam winced at the downpour. She shook herself out of the daze that had settled on her, filled with an odd certainty that she'd recall the moment for the rest of her entire life.
"Let's go get that flag!" She tugged Adam inside the bunker's archway. On a normal day, she knew, there'd be Sergeants to block their path, making them fight as a squad for every step of progress. Today, they met nothing but the first dry place they'd seen since the rain started. Adam liked that a lot, shaking his hands and rubbing at his arms.
"Cold?" Teela asked.
"Ah?" Adam cocked his head, slightly distracted by the captured armor and weapons used to decorate the bunker to give the stronghold an authenticity. It didn't impress her nearly as much as the rainbow. Teela hugged herself and shivered.
"Brrrrr!" She said, smiling at how Adam's eyes lit up with understanding.
"Brrr," he agreed. Teela snatched a wide, circular wooden shield from the wall. It was old and scarred up from a Hordesman spear thrust, but mostly intact for all that. The faded white limewash bore an odd device in gold that she couldn't quite make out in the gloom. It was, at first glance, an insect of some kind. Or maybe just a few symbols that appeared that way. Her curiosity couldn't overcome her duty, however, and she held it above Adam's head.
"Here," she said, "this'll keep the rain off us. Let's go get that flag!" Adam didn't quite understand her but was eager enough to follow and grateful for the shelter of the old rebel shield. She guided him up a flight of stone steps, legs aching and hefting the shield high. The rain pattered loud against the old wood, but, Teela guessed, the force of the downpour was lessening.
"Maybe the tank is running empty," she said to herself.
"Ah?" Adam pressed close to her to avoid getting any wetter.
"Nothing," Teela was good at knots, but untying a double constrictor one-handed was challenge even for her. She gave Adam the shield and knelt to work at it with both hands, throwing her helmet aside to see better. "That thing was so sweaty."
"Teela," Adam said softly, "help?"
"I've got it," she said, working at the wet ropes until they started coming free.
"Adam help?" He asked again and this time Teela understood. She threaded the rope between her fingers and smiled at him.
How many soldiers did it take to conquer a rebel castle? Just two, it turned out, if they could trust each other.
"Yeah, Adam," Teela gathered up the flag into a ball, "you did." The boy beamed at her and she gave his unprotected belly a tickle that made him leap backwards. "That's for tickling me earlier. Now, let's get out of this stupid rain." Adam followed at her heels, excited, one-word exclamations whispering from him every so often. "They should let you join my squad. If Colonel Blast lets you stay, we can take turns using my bunk. The floor isn't that much harder anyway."
"Ah," Adam said, voice echoing slightly in the bunker. Teela brightened as the thought of all they had to look forward to overrode the fear and anxiety that had threatened to suffocate her at the bottom of the hill.
"And I can train you at the stuff you don't know," she said, "like marching, callsigns, and stuff like that."
"Teela," Adam said.
"And you can show me how you move so quiet and how to climb and…"
A figure was waiting for them on the flat plain of the hill, hard eyes set firmly on the pair of them. She watched the water running through the scarring on his cheek, dripping down onto her arm, and beading at the very tip of the longsword clutched in his left hand.
"Colonel Blast," Teela swallowed the lump in her throat and tossed the flag onto the ground, "mission accomplished, sir." The Colonel's eyes were on Adam and no words or complex explanations had to pass between them to understand the man's intent. Adam began to build a little growl in the back of his throat.
"Cadet Teela, you're dismissed back to the bottom of the hill," his voice was quiet, almost absent, "go there now."
"Ok," Teela kept the tremble out of her voice by sheer will, then took Adam's hand, "l-let's go, Adam-"
"He stays."
"Sir," Teela took a deep breath, "I can't do that." Blast's eyes finally moved to her and there was smallest twinge of regret in them, hastily buried under a grim calm.
"Alright," he sighed, "alright, then, Cadet Teela." The Colonel moved faster than Teela could've expected, clearing the distance between them in a few strides, sword dipping down before coming upwards. Teela stumbled back, her training forgotten until she walked right into Adam. The edge of a shield poked her hard in the back and suddenly she could hear Sgt. Coral in her head, screaming at Teela to defend herself like a soldier.
She took the shield from him without looking and lifted it to meet the sword. There was a crunch and a terrible pressure that jarred her whole body. She heard herself shriek in fright but that hardly matter.
"Help!"
Adam, run! Just run!
Teela wasn't running, she guarding him with the big shield, looking so scared Adam thought she'd faint but she wasn't moving an inch. The big sword was dug deep into the old wood, stuck fast but coming free with every small tug of the bald man's poweful arms. He was furious. Wide eyes showing whites and scarred mouth frothing like an animal.
"By the power of Grayskull." Adam said. He had to help. Somehow.
Stop. Stop stalling and run!
"By the power of Grayskull!"
"Aaah!" Teela was tugged off her feet and the shield came straight out of her hands, clinging to the man's sword. He roared his frustration at them.
Adam squeezed his eyes shut, begging for a bolt of lightning to strike him and give him power he could use.
Adam!
He ignored the Other One and focused on the need to find strength. From somewhere. From anywhere.
Adam, stop! It's not safe!
There was a sensation in his mind like a door cracking open and suddenly Adam beheld the searing blue light locked away in the dark. He was aware of the Other One screaming at him to turn back, to run, to stop looking into the heart of the growing light.
"By the power of Grayskull," he growled softly. The blue light tensed like a wolf hearing a twig snap then leapt at Adam with all its might.
Teela ran at Colonel Blast as he struggled to rip his weapon free of the rebel shield, seizing on the idea that, if she could only shove him hard enough, she might make him slip on the mud. She didn't have to wonder what the plan afterwards would be. Blast saw her coming.
He turned, his foot rose up, and Teela was on her side a second later, blinking in shock, whimpering and clutching her stomach. That had hurt. That had really, really, really, hurt.
She was good at fighting. None of it made sense. She heard a splintering sound as the sword broke free of shield at last. She had to get up. She had to help Adam. Adam was her friend. Adam was counting on her.
But it hurt so much. So much worse than she ever thought someone could get hurt. She squeaked in fright as Blast stomped past her, whimpering quietly and trying to play dead.
You coward. You coward! It wasn't fair. What could she do? But she had to do something.
"Stop!" She yelled. Blast paused and she cringed into a ball. The Colonel turned and lunged at her, covering her with body. The world jumped in a flash of light and the sound of thunder.
"Cadet?" The noise in her ears faded, her stomach reminded her that it hurt a lot, and Colonel Blast was shaking her shoulders hard. "Cadet?" The man who'd kicked her so hard looked impossibly relieved when she blinked at him. "There you are. You're alright…"
"Wha-?" She swallowed the word.
"Magic," Blast snarled, "magic is what happened." He turned and jabbed a finger towards Adam. "Magic!" The rain was still pelting down on them, adding cold, wet misery the chaos
"Magic?" Teela was too confused by the last few minutes to understand his words. Magic. Magic was bad. Magic was the worst thing ever. Magic was wild and dangerous. The people who used it were cruel and wanted everyone to be their slaves. She tensed up as her brain finally started working, she squealed again at the pain in her belly.
Magic. A magic user. A princess or something like it. Here? Now? Adam. Adam was in danger.
"Adam," she struggled to sit up, "Adam, run…"
In the center of a smoking, black patch of cracked clay that had once been mud, Adam slumped down onto his knees. His eyes glowed a bright, radioactive blue and twitched in every direction with vacant horror.
"No," he said softly, "no. No." On in a gentle repetition. "No. No. No."
Teela wanted to be sick, even if her stomach hurt worse than ever.
"No. No. No."
"Magic," Blast said.
Adam, her friend, was a magic user.
"No. No. No."
"He," Blast said, "is our enemy." He stood up and retrieved his long blade. The rain sputtered briefly before pouring down all the harder. "And we kill our enemies, Cadet Teela. For the good of the Horde."
"No," Teela whispered, harmonizing with Adam just once.
"They're evil, Cadet Teela," Blast said, sounding almost desperate, "evil to the core."
"Adam…"
"Adam is your friend now but if you met out there?" Blast pointed at the sky with his sword. "Out there he'd kill you. You wouldn't stand a chance against him. And he won't stay here, Teela, he's not a good fit. Not like you. Not like me."
"No." Adam said again. "No. No."
Teela heard the weighty shimmer of the sword twirling in Blast's hand.
"Prove to me," Blast said, "that you're a good soldier. And you understand what has to be done." The weight surprised her when he pressed the hilt in between her limp palms. Teela finally got to hold a real sword.
"No. No. No."
"Teela," Blast knelt, looking her in the eyes, "are you a good soldier?"
"I…" Teela's mouth worked, "I…"
The rain fell on them all, filling the silence where her answer formed.
AUTHOR'S NOTE:
Well, it's been a minute. I apologize for the wait, but the only thing I can offer as explanation is that life simply gets in the way of things sometimes. I've been working on other projects, community commitments, job, etc. Happy 2nd Birthday to this fic! If you've been around since the start, wow, you guys are seriously amazing and I'm so grateful. If you're just joining us, welcome and I hope this story is a nice break from, what continues to be, a very difficult time for all of us.
I know some people are worried that I might abandon this story. I'll say that I enjoy writing Adam and his friends too much to ever do so. I want to see this accomplished. I won't promise scheduled updates but these hiatuses, when they happen, are not something I want to make a habit of. The next chapter should, with luck, be out in a few weeks. And the chapter following it shortly there-after.
Thanks for taking the time to read this little story I started in isolation two years back. Enjoy and I hope you all have an easy day/night.