Chapter 12: Ties that Bind
Glimmer stared out a window of one of Bright Moon's guest rooms and watched Enclave and Etherian laborers work in the sun. Four days had passed since the Rebellion had returned to the planet's surface, and a whole two weeks since the citadel had been invaded. Horde Prime had taken his armada and abandoned Etheria altogether after a lengthy stint of negotiation. Glimmer hadn't been present for it, but the result was acceptable nonetheless: Horde Prime had left only one member of his retinue behind.
She found him walking among the workers, occasionally referencing a large tablet held in his left hand, occasionally speaking with Adora and Micah who walked with him as they inspected the work. Salas had taken over organizing and leading the Enclave's efforts to help Etheria rebuild.
"It's still weird to see him walking around helping like that," Catra said, standing to her left and looking out at the same view. "He was defending Horde Prime and fighting Shadow Weaver and your dad not all that long ago."
Glimmer caught the hesitation in Catra's words at her mention of Shadow Weaver. No one had seen her since the clones dragged them off to individual cells, and they had only recently found out Prime had taken her with him when he left.
"Taline told you it's thanks to him you aren't brain damaged, right?" Glimmer asked. "Apparently he linked our minds to give you something to hold onto when the Emperor probed you, and then used himself as an anchor after I was taken away."
"She told me," Catra said with a grimace and a nod. "He's also the one who apparently pushed the medical team to come check on us when you first got sick, after he saw me screaming at the surveillance cameras. And I guess he's the one who urged Taline herself to come check on me as soon as she arrived."
"Taline had one of her Sentinels bring you to the infirmary, yeah" Glimmer said. "But I didn't know it was Salas who had her go to us first thing." Her dad broke out in laughter down below at something Salas had whispered to him and Glimmer frowned. "He's certainly more on our side than I expected. I'm surprised Taline got Horde Prime to back off as much as he did, leaving just him behind."
"Me too," Catra said.
Her father's laughter grew stronger and he started nudging Adora with his elbow. When her shoulders visibly relaxed, Catra's tighten as if in direct response.
"Even Adora is playing nice with him," Catra said, putting her hands on the windowsill and gripping them hard enough her nails scratched the stone there.
"Have you talked to her yet?"
Catra tensed and Glimmer feared she had pushed their newfound comfortability around each other too far. "Not yet," she said after a pause. "Every time I work up the courage to go to her, she gets dragged off to help with some other thing. It's like she always has to be doing something. Can't sit still for a second, and the universe conspires to help her with that at my expense."
Glimmer "hmm'd"
"That's Adora for you," Catra said, after giving a wry laugh. "Always running off to play the hero. Always—" she cut off, holding the tension in her shoulders for a beat before releasing it with an exhale and speaking in a more subdued tone. "No. I haven't gotten the chance to talk to her yet."
Glimmer nodded, content to let those words just hang between them. Catra had grown less skittish with time, opening up about things Glimmer didn't think her open to discussing in the first place. It surprised her, and that surprise compounded when she realized she was open to reciprocating.
"I haven't gotten the chance to speak with her either yet," Glimmer said. "Or Bow. Not really."
"Seriously?" Catra turned to her with an open expression of shock. "So many people have come to see you, all squealing in happiness that you're back, but not Arrow Boy or Adora?"
Glimmer gave a rueful laugh and pulled her broken arm closer against her body in its sling. It was true that everyone from Frosta to Scorpia and even Kyle, Lonnie, and Rogelio—who had all miraculously made it out alive after taking blaster fire directly to their armor—had come to express absolute joy that she was back safe and sound. Salas and the rest of the princesses practically had to pull her dad away from her to help with the relief efforts because he didn't want to leave her side. But Bow and Adora?
"Not Adora, but I have talked to Bow," Glimmer said.
Both Catra's eyebrows shot up when she heard the uncertainty in Glimmer's voice. "And?"
"But we didn't talk talk…if you get what I mean." Glimmer sighed. "He's just as busy as Adora with the reconstruction. Our 'talk', if you could even call it that, was…frostier than I hoped it'd be. I tried to apologize…he didn't want to hear it."
A long silence curled around them. Catra's expression cycled out the corner of Glimmer's eye—poor girl was trying to wrack her mind for words to say.
"Maybe once things settle down, he'll be more open," she said at last. "Probably just needs to process still, y'know?"
"Yeah. Maybe." Glimmer's lips tugged up into a smirk despite the mood; she'd never imagined Catra of all people would try to comfort her, let alone that it might actually work. She swallowed and let the thought pass. "How do you like it in Bright Moon so far?" she asked.
Catra shrugged. "S'fine, I guess."
Glimmer scoffed and rolled her eyes. "Just fine? You do realize you're not a prisoner here, right? Neither of us are on the citadel any more. You can wander and go find all the hidden spots in the castle I haven't come across even after living here for twenty years. Do the kitchens not beckon to you with promises of food you never got to eat in the Horde? If all you can say is 'it's fine' then you, Ma'am, haven't taken advantage of all your freedoms here yet."
Catra had the decency to at least smile at her attempt at levity. "Honestly? I don't really feel welcome here after everything I've done," Catra said, not taking her eye away from the window. "It's got nothing to do with you…it's just me. Aside from Taline, who's been locked up in the war room with Entrapta since we got here, I'm not really getting my hopes up for any visitors."
"Catra…"
"I'm doing okay so far," she said. "Really. Not good, not bad. Just okay, which is a hell of a lot better than either of us have been in a while."
Glimmer couldn't argue with that, although she did freeze at the mention of Taline and Entrapta working together. Catra hadn't been joking when she said they could bring her mother back. It was the first thing Taline dragged Entrapta off to work on when Horde Prime finally left them alone. Catra had probably glossed over that topic on purpose, maybe to afford her the same respectful distance Glimmer had granted her by not delving into Shadow Weaver when she was brought up. But Glimmer decided it was worth delving into if it meant another opportunity for them to bond a little more. What could she say? Her time aboard the Citadel had endeared Catra to her, and she wasn't too proud to push for a deeper friendship.
"I went down there myself a few hours ago," Glimmer said. "They've really been working non-stop since they arrived. Thank god for the windows because the smell alone tells me they haven't left once, not even to shower."
Catra laughed. "Did they say when they might be ready?"
"Tomorrow, actually," Glimmer said. "If everything keeps going smoothly. Entrapta was strangely excited about it because Taline apparently has something planned for her afterward. You don't happen to know what that is, do you?"
"No idea whatsoever," Catra said, her tone implying the exact opposite. She was the only one to have attended Taline's negotiations with Prime and, although she refused to disclose exactly what had happened, the rumor was that Catra had played an important part in winning some key concessions from the Emperor.
"Fine," Glimmer said with a laugh and a roll of her eyes. "Keep your secrets. If it's half as amazing as bringing my mom back, then I'm sure it's something special."
A comfortable silence extended between them for a few moments. Adora, Micah, and Salas had long since disappeared from view, but they continued to watch the day's reconstruction work until Glimmer spoke again.
"You said you weren't expecting any visitors other than maybe Taline." She knew she was easing into a touchy subject. "Why is that?"
"I dunno."
Glimmer cocked an eyebrow and chose to wait her out. Catra had a lot more to say and just didn't know how to say it, she knew that much.
Catra gripped the stone windowsill again like she'd float away if she weren't careful. "I guess…I guess it felt nice?" she said. "She wasn't exactly gentle or cautious when she came to see me in the infirmary. She kinda just walked up and stuck a needle in my arm while I was having a panic attack. That sounds bad now that I say it out loud, but…I don't know." She huffed. "She was so calm when she explained everything to me, said everything she was going to do and everything that was going to happen. It was like, even though she wasn't giving me a choice in things, I could trust that she was going to take care of me. It felt…well…"
"Safe?"
Catra nodded. "Yeah, safe. And then she complimented me when I was figuring out why she was even there taking over for the Emperor in the first place." She frowned, her hold on the windowsill growing stronger. "I'm so used to people looking down on me I just…don't know what to think when they don't. Is that weird?"
Glimmer shook her head. "I don't think that's weird at all. Maybe she sees something in you."
Catra scoffed. "Yeah right."
"I'm serious. She didn't call anyone else aside from you out of their cell to help her with negotiations, did she? Judging by the lack of Horde Prime presence and the fact we're all still alive, I'd say they went well."
Catra turned her head away from her so she couldn't see her face and gave a wildly exaggerated shrug. She definitely said something that affected her, and Glimmer hoped it had been in a positive way.
"I don't know about that," Catra said. Another silence grew between them, one that Glimmer wasn't sure Catra was going to dig herself out of as the seconds ticked by.
"Are you worried about her?" Glimmer asked. "She offered herself up in our place, and Horde Prime fully intended on killing us. Do you think…when she leaves…?"
Catra cringed, and Glimmer feared she had just made everything worse.
"No, he's not going to kill her," Catra said, relaxing after a moment. "I was only there for negotiations on Etheria's behalf. Everything else was behind closed doors, but she did say she avoided an execution when I asked."
"That's a relief," Glimmer said, not taking her eyes off Catra.
"He's not going to kill her, but she's still uneasy—I could just tell. Whatever he did decide on, it's still terrible. And from what little I saw in the few memories of his I experienced, it makes sense. Killing her would have been too clean and easy an end. He wanted to put her down and humiliate her…watch her suffer."
"Like, put her in a prison or torture chamber for the rest of her life?"
"I can't be sure, but I don't think that's going to happen either. The way she phrased it, she's too important to both the Enclave and the Empire for something like that."
"If he's not going to kill her and not going to lock her away in a torture chamber forever, then what the heck is he going to do?"
"Good question," Catra said. She narrowed her eyes, still looking out the window, and sighed. "Now that I think about it, as much as I'd like it, I guess I don't actually expect her to stop by and visit me either. She's got a lot of other things to worry about. It's just…you have so many visitors, but for me she's the only one I can realistically see having any reason to come by. It's not like Adora is going to come see me any time soon, but I'm kind of hoping at least Taline does. I don't know, it's stupid."
"It's not stupid." Glimmer reached over and placed a hand atop Catra's on the windowsill. "And even if she doesn't come, you'll still have at least one visitor."
Catra didn't pull her hand away like Glimmer expected. Instead, she looked at her with a bewildered expression. "Who?"
"Me," Glimmer said, teasing her with a grin. "I'm your visitor. And despite what you think, it's not because I'm itching to relive our wonderful experience together in that cell."
Catra laughed and Glimmer felt the air around them ease up.
"You know," Glimmer said, feeling brave enough to push her luck with the touchy subjects. "I haven't been able to sleep well since we got back. The nightmares have been keeping me up. I know you have them too."
Catra's hand tensed underneath hers and Glimmer gave a reassuring squeeze to bring her back down. They hadn't talked about it. Up until that very moment, it had never felt like an appropriate time to address it. Strangely, only Adora, Catra, and herself seemed affected by them, if they glassy listless gaze constantly on their faces were any indication. The others on the citadel, her dad included, seemed unaffected. Whatever happened when Taline had broken that crystal seemed to have also broken something in their dreams as well.
Better nightmares than experiencing the actual memory, Taline had said to them, not long after they admitted to her what they had been suffering from. Adora at least had She Ra's protection to shield her from them…I was relieved it left an imprint on so few people, and that your minds seemed to have stepped in anyways to protect you, on some level.
Still, as relieved as Taline sounded about them not actually see the actual memory inside the crystal, Glimmer couldn't shake the visions of Narre and Miri's real deaths alongside her friends' hypothetical ones in her head, no matter what she did to relax before drifting off most nights.
"I'm worried they'll never go away," Catra said in a tiny voice. "Every day I see…"
She faltered and Glimmer squeezed her hand harder. "I'm sure they'll go away at some point. Or at least affect us less."
Catra nodded. She turned her hand palm-up and gave Glimmer a squeeze back. "Thank you for visiting me."
Glimmer laughed and nudged her with her elbow. "Come on now, I know you missed our bonding sessions back up in space. I figured, why deprive you of them when I could just come bother you for fun?" She watched Catra try and fail to hide the smile breaking out on her face.
"You are so full of it, you know that?" Catra said, shoving her back, careful not to catch her injured arm. "I'll never know how I survived all that time together with you without ripping my hair out."
"You're one to talk," Glimmer said with a smirk. "Worst cellmate ever."
Catra lunged for her and Glimmer screamed, teleporting around the bed nearby while Catra darted left and right trying to catch her. Laughter pealed around the room as they continued, until Glimmer heard a knock. They both froze and turned to see a familiar face standing at the open door, holding an ice pack against the side of his head.
"Bow!" Glimmer said, smoothing out her outfit and fixing her hair. "H-how long have you been standing there?"
"Not too long," Bow said. He cleared his throat. "Can we talk please?"
Glimmer chewed at the inside of her lip. He had a hard look in his eyes that set her even further on edge. "Sure, give me a second?"
Bow nodded. "I'll wait in your room. Whenever you're ready." He turned to head back into the hall, but paused before turning back around. "Catra?" he said.
Catra gave a strangled noise before schooling her voice into a poor approximation of calm. "Yeah?
"I don't know where I got it in my head you can't hit very hard because you're small and stringy, but you pack one hell of a punch." He pulled the ice pack away from his face, revealing a lump at the side of his head large enough to make Glimmer cringe. "It's taken a while, but the swelling has finally started going down. Anyway, I wanted to say thank you for watching over Glimmer up there. I really appreciate it."
"Y-yeah, don't mention it," Catra said. She seemed almost in disbelief that Bow had something nice to say to her at all.
Bow finally slipped out the door, and the unease Glimmer had felt earlier grew to full-blown panic. He was finally ready to talk, but what would he say? What was going to happen to them? A hand squeezed her shoulder, and she looked over to see Catra giving her an intense look, tail swishing behind her.
"It'll be fine, Sparkles," she said. "Just be chill."
Glimmer bit her lip. "What if he doesn't want to listen to me? What if I apologize and he still hates me?"
"I don't know," she said with a shrug. "But even if that did happen…it'll still be okay."
"It will not be okay if that happens," Glimmer said, making a face. She didn't want to let her mind even wander down that road.
"It will," Catra said, squeezing her harder. "Stop thinking with your fear and start thinking with your brain. I hated you for years after Adora left me to join your little rebellion. And you know what? In the span of a month…well, I don't hate you anymore. Bow's supposed to be your best friend, right? If I couldn't keep hating you then what chance does he have? And if he really does say he's done, then it will still be okay."
The look in Catra's eyes seemed to say "I lost it all and more, but here I am," and Glimmer calmed. Yeah, things would be okay. She'd absolutely hate life for a long while if they didn't make up, but she would be okay, one way or the other.
Glimmer pulled her into a hug. "You're the best, Catra. Thank you."
She pulled away before Catra could respond, caught the dumbstruck look on her face, and rushed to chase after Bow only to nearly barrel straight into Scorpia on her way out.
"Oh, uh hey Glimmer!" Scorpia said, careful not to slosh the two cups of tea she held in her claws while she braced against the door. "I was looking for Catra's room and thought this was it. Oh geeze, did I get the wrong room?"
"You got the right place," Glimmer said. She held the door open wider for Scorpia to peek inside. "She's in there. I'm sure she'll be really happy to see you."
Scorpia's eyes lit up and Glimmer felt a stab of elation for Catra upon seeing it; unlike Bow's glare from earlier, Scorpia was actually looking forward to this meeting—looking forward to a heartfelt reconciliation. Glimmer shooed her inside and shut the door behind her to give them privacy. Catra's cry of surprise echoed out from the other side moments later, and Glimmer couldn't suppress the smile that broke out across her face.
Now if only she and Bow could get some of that. Maybe then that knot she had felt in her chest ever since returning to Etheria could begin to loosen.
Stop thinking with your fear and start thinking with your brain, she chanted to herself as she walked down the hall back to her own room. Whatever happens, it will be okay. It will.
They brought Queen Angella back the next day. Glimmer thought she'd cried all the tears her body could produce after Bow admitted with a morose face that he still didn't feel right about things between them, but nothing compared to the reaction she experienced seeing Taline pull her mother through the giant portal they had set up in the war room.
Her mom was fine, if a bit surprised to see the sheer number of people surrounding her and openly weeping for joy. She seemed even more surprised to learn how much time had passed since her disappearance—to her, it had felt like only a few minutes since she parted from Adora. The Princesses, Bright Moon's citizens, Royal Guards, Micah, all of them celebrated at Angella's side until she suddenly grew disoriented and Salas motioned to the medical team on standby to pull her away.
"She'll be okay," Taline had said to her and her father, the ones least cooperative in letting her go. "Salas' specialty is stabilizing minds. It's why he excelled as Prime's assistant. Angella is perfectly healthy, she just needs rest and time to ease back into this reality."
Glimmer finally stopped protesting after she promised they could see her again soon, and she folded herself into her dad's arms to cry even harder as the crowd dispersed. Frosta had actually brought her a glass of water shortly after in fear Glimmer would dehydrate herself crying so much, and when she moved to accept the glass, she also glimpsed Catra approaching Adora in the far corner of the room.
She rooted for her, until Adora turned on her heel and march away the moment she noticed Catra approaching. As quickly as it had come, the overwhelming happiness Glimmer experienced seeing her mom come back to them all at once colored with sorrow, and her tears suddenly felt bittersweet seeing the look of panicked dejection on Catra's face.
Days passed, and that feeling unfortunately never went away. Despite the hours she spent at her mom's bedside and despite the hours she spent with her helping rebuild Bright Moon with Salas and the Enclave, Glimmer only grew more uncomfortable the longer she spent time with…other people. The awkward, guarded words and unsteady, unreadable body language she got from Bow every time they spoke didn't help, either.
No matter what she tried, she couldn't figure out how to shake the sense she no longer belonged there either, same as Catra had said. It wasn't the nightmares, which had finally subsided for the both of them. Taline had chalked it up to post traumatic stress when she finally spoke of it to her. For a time, that seemed an adequate explanation.
But then Glimmer and Adora made up—truly made up—and she witnessed first-hand how Adora seemed determined to train and spar herself into an early grave. The Enclave had helped her reforge the Sword of Protection, but she still hadn't been able to transform into She Ra.
"It's just a matter of time," she'd hear Adora mutter to herself under her breath. "I just need to be stronger. Need to be faster. She'll come back."
Glimmer had a sneaking suspicion Adora's nightmares hadn't let up, and the more she witnessed her obsess over training, the stronger that "out of place" feeling hit. Soon enough, 'stress' no longer seemed a sufficient explanation.
"Whatever you do, don't let it drive you to open a portal and destroy the world," Catra said during one of their unofficial 'meals together, just the two of them' appointments. "And if you do, I wouldn't bank on a second intergalactic empire swooping in and helping fix things. Seems like a once-a-campaign kind of thing, y'know?"
Her tone had been light, but they ended up speaking long into the night about how that "out of place-ness" was a daily constant for Catra like she had said in the beginning. It only solidified Glimmer's inkling that her own issue went far deeper than she initially realized, and likely wouldn't go away on its own.
It wasn't until she almost interrupted her parents during a private moment that she finally understood what had happened to her. Micah sounded distraught, and Glimmer peeked through a crack in the doorway to find him openly weeping in Angella's arms. He lamented having lost so many happy years together with her, openly expressed his sorrow at having missed out on seeing his own daughter grow up into a "fine young woman", and spoke of his terror at having come home only to learn he might have lost them both forever.
And when, in the face of all this turmoil, Glimmer looked to her mom and saw her equally anguished expression—saw her also at a complete loss for what to say back—Glimmer finally realized that the "out of place" feeling she had been haunted by for weeks was only her picking up on how much everything and everyone around her had changed. Bright Moon was no longer the same. Glimmer herself was no longer the same. Her relationships were no longer the same.
She turned that very instant and raced down the hall as fast as she could with tears stinging her eyes, only to just make it to Taline's temporary quarters before finally falling apart.
Taline, bless her heart, merely set Narre's cracked helmet she had been cradling alone off to the side, got up to close the door behind Glimmer to give them privacy, and guided her to take a seat on the bed.
"What's going on?" she asked, taking a seat next to her. "It's visitation hours, isn't it? Shouldn't you be spending time with your mom and your dad? Why are you crying?"
It took Glimmer several false starts before she got any words out. Taline stayed quiet, rubbing her back until she finally could.
"You're supposed to be leaving soon, right?" Glimmer asked between hiccups. "Within the next week or two?"
Taline frowned, and Glimmer tried to not let her gaze linger on the thick gauze still covering her cheek. Prime had apparently done some permanent damage if she still had to wear that thing after so much time. "Who told you when I was supposed to go?"
Everyone knew Taline would leave at some point; it was part of the deal she had struck with Prime to get him to leave first. But no one had an exact timeframe, and Taline's reaction told Glimmer her guess wasn't far off.
"Catra and I thought it would be soon," she said. "Reconstruction is in full swing and research on the Heart will begin soon, right? I know it's supposed to be a secret and I promise I won't say anything until you announce it, but I just…I need to know."
Taline thought for a long moment before nodding with a sigh. "Unless something drastic happens, my last day will be at the end of the week, two weeks from today."
Glimmer sniffled and looked at Narre's helmet, propped on the desk across from her. "I know I wasn't exactly cooperative when we first met, but can I ask you for a favor before you go?"
Taline angled her head, the question plain on her face. Glimmer took a deep breath. She still had no idea what Taline was going to be doing after leaving, but if she had any authority left after Horde Prime was through with her, she had to take the chance.
The words came slow and halting at first, but she forced herself through them—forced herself to speak with Taline about what had been tossing around in her head ever since the "out of place" feeling first bothered her.
