Like Father, Like Daughter
Disclaimer: I don't own anything from Star vs. the Forces of Evil
Chapter 24: Perchance to Dream
A pale blue portal opened up in the middle of a nearby forest that overlooked the small city.
A scraggly old man, his eyes half glazed over with a hint of drool escaping his lips. His eyes twitched, and his body felt numb as he walked forwards.
His hands fumbled over a gun like a device that glowed with a blue light before the last bit of its energy died out and went off. The machine seemed to have been broken a dozen times, cannibalized and holding on by a thread to start with, it was amazing it worked as long as it did. The device tumbled out of his hand as he began to chuckle to himself, "Heh, hehe, at last."
He sighed before his body fell to the ground. The leaves of the tree moved slowly as a small breeze passed by. The dead body laid there undisturbed, not to be found anytime soon.
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Star Butterfly rubbed her head, life was stressful. It took her longer than she wanted to admit, but she understood why her mother was always such a fuddy-duddy. Running a kingdom was dull and tedious. It looked like she had to lead everyone by the hand and make sure most people didn't get themselves killed. Everytime she tried to do something to help and change things for the better, the people would complain and usually ignore her.
Queen Star Butterfly didn't see the point to it when she was a kid, this all seemed so much simpler. Star asked for a break from the latest meeting of the Magical High Commission. Not that it mattered, the other members were busy arguing amongst each other.
Star had no idea how they did this so often. Lekmet would bleat something that only Rhombulus could understand, Rhombulus would go to crystallize something as his solution, Hekapoo would order Rhombulus to the timeout corner, and Omni would literally phone into the meeting.
Star needed just to get away for a moment. She wanted to run, but that wasn't much of an option. The big puffy dress she had to wear as a queen made it nearly impossible to run. The entire outfit was just uncomfortable, the hair and the make-up, no wonder her mom barely smiled.
Star stepped out into the hall and took a sigh.
"Mama?"
Star blinked by the sudden voice. Standing in the hall was a small girl only about seven. Standing next to the little girl was her father, Marco. The years had been kind to Marco. The scrawny safety kid had grown into a seasoned warrior. He had messy windswept hair, muscles on muscles and a tendency to wear clothes that showed off his abs.
And those abs…
"Hey Star," Marco's voice rang in her ears.
The small girl giggled in Star's arms, "Hey Auntie Star."
"Hey Seraph," Star greeted Marco and Hekapoo's daughter.
Star forced on a practiced smile, of course, this little bundle of joy was their daughter. There was a time that Star thought that she and Marco would always be together having fun and crazy adventures, but before she knew it Hekapoo came in, and they spent less and less time. Then it was time to return to Mewni, and Marco followed after Hekapoo, and they were getting married. Soon after came Seraph.
Star held the girl tighter in her arms; she adored her in many ways and thought of her like the daughter she never had. The young Seraph was bright, cute, and such a sweet girl. For a quiet moment, she thought to herself that if she ever had a daughter with Marco, would she be just as amazing?
"Star, you okay?" Marco asked.
"Uh, yeah, sure, just a bit tired. It's been a long day." Star reassured him.
Star found herself looking at Seraph's face and smiled.
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"Man this is boring," Marco whispered.
The class was watching a video, and it was dull. The narrator had the most monotone voice he had ever heard.
Marco could barely stay awake. He looked around, and it looked like everyone else had fallen asleep. Even the teacher was fast asleep.
Marco glanced around and spotted Star with her face flat on the desk and snoring loudly. In the middle of her sleep, she gave a kick and just continued sleeping. As Marco looked around, he noticed that it looked like everyone had fallen asleep. Well, almost everyone, Marco heard some scribbling.
Beside him, he noticed Seraph was still wide awake but instead of taking notes or anything was busy sketching some things. Usually, Marco would say something about that, but the video was that boring he couldn't fault her for doing anything to at least stay awake.
Marco raised his hand, and the teacher didn't notice him because they were still asleep. With a bit of hesitation, he got up and walked up to them, "Uh, can I borrow the hall pass? I need to use the restroom."
Marco noticed they didn't react, so he gave them a nudge to try and wake them. Nothing happened, Marco just grabbed the pass from the desk and made his way out.
Marco walked out in the hall rubbing his eyes, he felt as if he stayed in the room any longer he'd probably fall asleep like everyone else. He cracked his neck as he walked, he couldn't shake this dreary feeling. It's just sort of feeling like a strange day, the air felt thicker and just barely noticeably harder to walk through.
Anyway, Marco did what he set out to do. After a few minutes, he found himself cleaning his hands when he heard some snoring coming from one of the stalls.
"Johnny? Is that you? Did you fall asleep again?"
Marco let him sleep, this happened enough that no one paid it too much attention. The guy had been held back seven years and sometimes just dozed off, probably one of the reasons he kept getting held back.
Marco finished in the restroom and made his way back to the classroom. On his way back he met a strange sight. He found Sabrina fast asleep her face in the water fountain, her hand still holding down the button causing the water to spill over her face.
"Sabrina?" Marco pulled her hand away, but she didn't respond to him. He knew full well that the girl had a tendency to get herself hurt. "Are you okay?" He worried she had somehow knocked herself out in the middle of getting a drink. He tried to nudge her into consciousness again but to no result.
He was getting worried and wasting no more time he picked her up and carried her towards the nurse's office. He didn't waste another moment and rushed her to the nurse's office.
"Nurse Batterbrook!" Marco kicked the door open, "We got a problem, Sabrina-"
Marco was stunned; he found the nurse holding a tongue depressor in a student's mouth and both of them fast asleep.
Marco placed Sabrina in a nearby bed as he tried to wake them up. It was strange. He had waved off the sleeping class and Johnny being asleep as coincidences but now Sabrina and the nurse's office was too much.
"Everyone is asleep, and they're not waking up. Star didn't do anything today. An attack? No, no one is doing anything. Wait, why aren't I asleep too?" Marco blinked as an old memory he'd rather forget crept into his mind. "No. No. No!" He panicked.
He ran out of the room as fast as he could. He rushed out into the halls, and he found a few students and staff who'd fallen asleep in the middle of walking. He rushed into the gym where he found two teams in the middle of a game of dodgeball, but everyone had fallen to the ground asleep leaving a few balls scattered around. Marco rushed around finding Skeeves sleeping in his chair without a care. He found Mister Candle asleep at his desk even though he spilled some hot coffee on himself. Marco rushed to the school gate and spotted out that a car had jumped the curb as its driver was sleeping soundly slumped over the steering wheel. Nearby there were a group of birds that fell out of the sky now sleeping on the ground. There were even some squirrels that fell out of the tree asleep. Marco pulled out his cell phone and called his parents, and to his dismay they didn't pick up. Marco rushed back to his classroom.
"Seraph!" Marco yelled out finding Seraph still drawing in her notes.
"Dad?" Seraph didn't finish as Marco wrapped his arms around her.
"Seraph we have to leave right now!"
"Dad, what's wrong?"
Marco paused unsure of how to tell her, "Did your Mom ever tell you about the Dream Eater?"
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Hekapoo leaned back into her chair, she found herself a lovely spot with just the right amount of light and opened up her book. She didn't know why, maybe it was motherhood, but she had gotten into more leisurely activities like reading. The whole reading thing had started off with her reading books on parenting and then she just sort of started reading stuff. Considering how hectic life could be with her job, having something so peaceful at times was an excellent way to relax.
Just as she was getting into her book, her compact rang, "Talk to me."
"Hekapoo!" Marco's voice rang out panic filtered in his voice.
"Is something wrong?"
"The Dream Eater."
Hekapoo felt her throat close up, "No, no, we trapped it in the deepest and most barren part of my dimension. There is no one it could infect. It-"
"Come to Earth, come to the school, me and Seraph are here and-"
Before even she understood what was going on, she had already torn open a portal and was walking on to Earth. To her horror, they found countless people asleep and not waking up.
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Janna was leaving school for the day, she was leaving a lot later than other students because of her daily dose of detention. She slung her pack over her shoulder and walked out happy that it was Friday.
"Janna!" Janna quickly found a pair of warm arms wrapping around her.
She couldn't help but chuckle at the girl's excitement. Janna did love how this girl adored her, she did love her too. Sometimes it seemed so strange how this cute little kid was Marco's.
"Hey Janna," Marco greets her. "We were about to get some pizza, want to come along?"
Janna smirked, "We are already planning on hanging out all day tomorrow. If you two don't think you'll get tired of me, sure why not?"
"Like we could ever get tired of you." Seraph chirped.
Janna smiled as they started to walk towards the pizza place. Janna found that they ended up spending a lot of time together, she liked it. Even growing up, she never saw herself having a lot of friends to hang out with. Her detention friends were mostly there because they were all forced together and they made the best of it. Sure, she got along with school friends and hung out with them, but no one really went out of the way to invite her out. Marco wasn't much of an exception they sort of just hung out because they lived close to each other. Janna was always following him because, in the end it seemed like he was the only person she knew wouldn't push her away. Janna knew she was into some weird stuff, that was probably one of the reasons why people didn't usually rush to hang out with her. But Marco and now Seraph not only didn't mind her company, they seemed actually to like it.
It was a simple act, but it meant so much to Janna. So how couldn't she adore those two, how could she not love spending time with them?
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There is a story, something to scare people around the fireplace, but like so many stories it turns out to be at least a little right.
There was a story of a nightmare that didn't end with the dreamer waking. The dreamer just couldn't reject the dream, he accepted the horrors that his mind dreamt up and something inside him grew. No one was sure what caused it or how it happened, but the dream took a life of its own. It began to think and feel things that the Dreamer didn't and yearned for a life of its own, one outside of the dreamer. With the dreamer firmly in place, it did what all living things did, it ate. The Dream Eater gobbled up the dreamer's life and everything that made him and grew strong from it
And that have should be the end of it, but the Dream Eater spread like an infection hopping to one person to another. It trapped them in their bodies and drained their lives as they slept. As time passed, its power grew as did its influence, soon whole worlds fell under its sway and spent their last moments in the dream.
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Hekapoo did her best to explain things to Seraph as she looked over all the sleeping people in the classroom including Star.
"Yeah, this is the Dream Eater's work."
"I think I get what it is." Seraph mused.
"Good, cause we never really figured it out, " Hekapoo admitted, "even the origin is a theory. We don't know if it's some sort of weird mutation or a spell or if it's just a dream that came to life."
Seraph noticed how uncomfortable her father seemed, he was trying to be brave probably to keep her from freaking out. And she was trying really hard not to freak out. She didn't think something could scare both her parents like this.
Seraph kept talking, "So, how did you stop it the first time?"
"We didn't, not really," Hekapoo cringed at the memory, "we heard rumors about it. We even looked into it, but it's hard to get words about something that makes whole worlds fall asleep at the same time. Then it showed up on Mewni, it was the time when Lyric was in charge." Hekapoo recalled, "Lyric wasn't responding to our calls, so we headed out to Mewni to talk her."
"You and my uncles?"
"…Yeah, them." Hekapoo still found it hard to accept them like that, "When we arrived everyone was asleep. Since we really didn't need to sleep, it didn't seem to affect us. We had to do some digging and started to figure things out. The Dream Eater fed off a world, but spared a person and took over their body and used them to travel to another dimension, that's how he kept spreading around. It was powerful, but it could only influence one world at a time. Rhombulus thought if we could crystallize it and take him away, it would be fine. But that didn't work at all, we couldn't crystallize it, it was a living dream. It could switch into anyone under its influence."
"But there are people awake on Mewni… how did you beat it?"
"We outsmarted it." Hekapoo smirked, "We managed to gather some spells and tricked it into a dream. Once it was in a dream, we took the person he'd possessed into my dimension, into a small barren piece of dirt with no one around. When it realized what happened, I took the scissors it stole and left him to starve. We couldn't save the host by then so we had to leave him as its last meal." Hekapoo sighed, "That should have been it."
Marco said bitterly, "It was on trial, it was my fault. I thought I found a shortcut to finding your mom. I ended up on that barren piece of dirt."
"We thought it would have been dead by then, but I guess it wasn't that easy."
"Yeah, it just went dormant and slept until I got there and got infected. I didn't even notice it at right away, it was too weak to take me over, but I was feeling wrong." Marco ran his finger through his hair, "I just thought I got sick, that I was catching something." Marco shook his head ashamed, "I made my way to a small city and found a doctor. That's when it kicked in."
Hekapoo continued the story, "I kept track of your Dad, he never really stayed in any one place for too long unless he had a reason and usually that reason was me. So when I realized he hadn't moved in a few days, I checked in on him. That's when I found him fast asleep and the whole city asleep with him."
Marco wrung his hands and just focused on them.
"It didn't take me too long to figure out what had happened." Hekapoo brushed her bangs aside. "I knew there was a way to escape the Dream Eater, he'd been around long enough and had messed with enough people that every once in a while someone found their way out. That's where all those stories about him came from."
"What did they have to do?" Seraph asked quietly,
"Reject that dream, whatever it is. They had to reject the reality he created for them. When he infects a person, he put them to sleep and traps them in a dream feeding off the dreamer's emotion, but if the dreamer rejects it, they can pull away. But the hardest part is getting the dreamer even to start thinking the world they knew is false."
"So, the Dream Eater gives them like their happiest wish?" Seraph asked.
Hekapoo looked away, "Yeah, sometimes."
Hekapoo couldn't bring herself to talk about it any more than Marco. The Dream Eater didn't really care what the person dreamt, their own mind made what they would believe. If a person honestly thought they deserved riches, they got it, if they felt they deserved the punishment they got it, and so on. But the Dream Eater was inside Marco for a while before he acted and saw his thoughts and memories. The Dream Eater saw his memories of Hekapoo and remembered she had trapped him. Since he couldn't hurt Hekapoo, he decided to punish Marco in her stead.
For days Marco had been trapped in nightmares, the things he saw for days and couldn't escape it. In that time Marco had lost the life he had known, the Dream Eater twisted that idea and made Marco lose everyone he loved horribly over and over again letting him do nothing but watch.
If Hekapoo ever had any doubts the Dream Eater was evil, they vanished with those dreams. It took pleasure in hurting Marco and twisting the blade.
In all the years on the trail, nothing came close to breaking him that those days of none stop nightmares.
Hekapoo tried to push forward, "I used a spell to let me drop into Marco's dream. It took me a while to snap him out of it and then it found us. It had been paying close attention to Marco. It drew its power from all the people it had asleep, and it had enough people to pack a punch. We got lucky, as we escaped the dream, it followed us. There is this strange little quirk about it if it follows someone waking up it appears in the waking world but it's still a dream, and you can't stab, burn or kill a dream."
"You can trap it though." Marco said softly, "It was chasing after us, and your Mom tricked it back into that piece of dirt. And too far from anyone to power it, we hoped it was done for, but we were afraid it still lingered there waiting."
Seraph felt uneasy, her father was so anxious, "So, why aren't we asleep?"
Hekapoo answered, "I don't sleep normally, probably can't affect me. As for your Dad, he's already been affected by it once, I guess he's got immunity to it now, and he must have passed it on to you."
Seraph did feel a little particular about it like even without realizing it her dad was protecting her from the big old monster.
"What are we going to do?" Seraph asked eager to do something.
"We are leaving you with your uncles."
"What? What about everyone else?"
"Leave that to us." Marco placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder.
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"Keep an eye on her," Hekapoo demanded after she explained the situation.
"Right." Rhombulus agreed, her tone made it very clear that it wasn't a request but a demand.
They arrived at their home with an explanation of what new horror found its way towards the family.
Rhombulus just asked, "Are you sure you don't need any help?"
Hekapoo actually hesitated, "Just take care of her. Get Omni to watch the space over Echo Creek, don't let anyone portal in. The last thing we need is the Dream Eater to try and jump to another world."
Hekapoo moved over and kissed Seraph on the cheek, Marco smiled at her and told her, "We'll be back soon."
Seraph watched her parents walk into a portal and vanish. Her heart was aching, she hated the idea of leaving her friends like that, and she worried about her parents.
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The sun was bright, and the breeze was cold with the smell of the ocean and the sound of waves hitting the shore. People were running around having fun. It was a pleasant day, a day just to relax and have fun.
Jackie took a moment to brush off a wrinkle in her blue dress. They stood at the entrance to the pier where several booths for food and games waited.
"Are you ready?"
Jackie smiled, feeling her heart skip a beat as he slipped his hand in hers.
"Yeah," Jackie squeezed his hand, "let's go."
They walked onto the pier without a worry, it was a beautiful day, and they were together what else could they want.
As they walked around seeing what they would do first, Jackie silently wished for the day to last forever.
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Star held Seraph, Star felt a shiver go down her spine, and she caught a glimpse of something sweep across the window. She blinked unsure of what she saw.
"Hey," Marco spoke up, "how about I get us a couple of drinks from the vending machine? You look like you could use a pick me up, Star."
Star smiled; she loved how Marco was always so thoughtful, "Thanks, Marco. I'll keep this little spitfire entertained in the meanwhile."
Seraph giggled as Star tossed her into the air to catch her and throw her again.
"Don't drop her," Marco warned heading out.
"Like I'd do that," Star scoffed catching the girl again.
Alone Star marveled at the girl, the small life that Marco and Hekapoo had made. The delight she brought where she went and even if Star didn't see her that often she felt her heart full just being around her. Seraph tugged on her dress.
"Auntie Star? Can I tell you a secret?" Seraph looked at her curiously.
"Of course you can, I'm the best at keeping secrets."
Seraph motion to her to lean closer, "Mama and Papa told me something but told me not to tell anyone else. But you're Aunty Star so I'm sure they won't mind."
Star smiled, "Come on, dish."
"I'm going to be a big sister soon."
Star blinked, 'What?"
"Mama told me she's going to have a baby soon. I'm going to be a big sister! It's going to be so great!"
Star blinked she felt the hearts on her cheeks break, her eyes welling, she forced a smile to stay on. "That's so great."
Why did it hurt? Why did it hurt her so much? She was over this. Wasn't she. She lost Marco to Hekapoo- when did she lose him? When was Seraph born right? No, it was before that wasn't it? Seraph was young…
"I want to have lots of brothers and sisters." Seraph cheered.
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It didn't take Marco and Hekapoo long to agree on what they had to do. Hekapoo got a spell book as they settled into the classroom. Marco noticed Star kicking in her sleep, she looked upset. He knew better than most that the Dream Eater ever got to it he could be sadistic. He hoped she wasn't suffering a bad dream.
"Are you sure you want to do this?" Hekapoo told him, "there a lot of reasons why we shouldn't do this. Plus, with your past…"
Marco sighed, he spent days in the nightmare watching his loved ones die in horrible ways, some part of him knew it was not real, no matter how real the screams, the sounds of bones crunching, the warm feeling of their blood splattering on him… some small portion of doubt burned in him. That ember kept him sane, and when Hekapoo arrived, she managed to grow that flame and free him.
Then it was just that, a nightmare that left him shaken, but he forced himself to remember that it wasn't real. When he remembered it, he repeated that phrase like a mantra to keep that belief going.
"No, I have to do it. My friends and family are in danger, I need to face this. I need to make sure Seraph's home is a safe one."
"If you're sure." Hekapoo opened up the spell book, "Fidentus omnium. Magister mentium. Magnesium ad homenem. Magnun Opus. Habeas corpus. Inceptus Nolanus overratus. Magister mentium. Magister mentium. Magister mentium."
Hekapoo eye's glowed bright, and light consumed them.
Hekapoo gasped, the ride into people's dreams wasn't a pleasant one. She was sure the fritz screwing up magic wasn't making it any easier.
She found herself in a park, "Okay, Marco who-" Hekapoo stopped as she realized she was alone. "Oh no."
She was alone, she and Marco had been split when they went into the dream. She had no idea where he was.
Then she felt something strange a chill went down her spine, she senses something. She couldn't hear it or see it, but she felt it. She felt something deep, it was slow, and it knew that it was there.
The Dream Eater, it was close, and it knew she was there. Its power was always strongest in the dreams. She had to run if the Dream Eater knew she was the one who snuck into the dreams, it would not stop until she was dealt with. She hated to leave Marco on his own, but as the sky turned black she knew she couldn't stay here. She had to keep moving, or all of this would end there.
She had to run and at least if it chased her then maybe it wouldn't find Marco.
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"Don't worry," Rhombulus tried to reassure Seraph, "Your folks are going to be fine."
It did little to make her feel better.
"Baw baw baaa." Lekmet let out.
"That's a great idea." Rhombulus said, "Okay, so Lekmet is just going to get you some snacks, and I'll go call Omni to tell him what your Mom told us. You stay here and just try and relax." Rhombulus nudged Seraph towards the comfy chair between the crystals.
"Okay." Seraph whimpered as she was pushed into the chair. "I'm going to use the bathroom then." She got up and headed towards the bathroom.
Lekmet went to the kitchen to dig up some snacks, and Rhombulus went to the mirror. As Seraph found herself alone, she pulled out her pair of scissors. She knew her parents would be angry at her, but she hated the feeling of just leaving everything to them. She had to do something. So when the moment appeared, she cut open a portal back to the school.
She found her parents asleep on the floor of the class and a spellbook next to her mother. She was a quick reader, "Huh, a spell to dive into people's dream."
Seraph read the pages making sure she got everything. She wasn't much of a spell caster, her mom taught her a few spells usually to help with her powers. Mostly saying that she would try and teach her magic later, not telling her too much about the fritz and just waiting until it blew over. This spell was bigger than anything she had tried before. She didn't have a lot of talent with straight-up magic, but she decided to try it.
She was a lot like her father, unwilling to step down from a challenge when they thought they had to face it, especially if it was for those they cared about.
Seraph focused her thoughts and focused her energies into the words, "Fidentus omnium-"
Author's Notes: Some fan art from hibikikuze6698 go check them out on deviant art. They drew up some art for the series and the arc with the love bites so go there and comment on the art. And just because my memory has sucks I wanted to say some other people who've made some stuff. First check out r4zputin on tumblr and instagram, they made some art of seraph with marco and some with her and Hekapoo. A check out hammerjarljurenhar on tumblr who did some stuff with Seraph in a video kinda a fate series cross over. They have some more mature stuff too so not for a little kids.
Kittyarts on twitter recently did a piece for me with the Marcapoo family on their little trip.
zaicomaster14 on twitter and on their does a lot of marcapoo stuff check out did a scene from the last chapter with the family running from a mech.
I can't say enough how much I love and appreciate everyone who does stuff for my characters. Check them all out and support them if you can. Check out my tumblr addude because I usually have it there at some point. If you do anything like this please let me know I do want to try and shout everyone.
Okay, so onto the business sorry for the long delay besides the time for me writing the chapter my beta had some stuff come up, mostly getting a new job and moving to another state. So sorry for the delay. Okay, now I'm back lets get the story going. this is the first part of the new arc and I hope you like it so please leave a review telling me what you think..