CHAPTER FOURTEEN- Home

Well shit I haven't updated in a while I'm so sorry wow. I've had three quarters of this chapter written for the last month and couldn't find the inspiration for the last four pages that I needed. There were two ways I could have ended it; I chose the one that'll probably piss you all off lol. This isn't the last chapter though, there is one more and then (maybe) an epilogue, depending on how I write the next chapter.

Liliana Dragonshard: You'll just have to see, won't you?

SonicELITE: Not the end. Not that chapter anyway.

Jayswing96: Me? Write something suspicious? Nooooo

Godlegend: If you look back on the story, you would see that Star needed to fix the wand because Marco was DYING. Also, Toffee is kind of indestructible. I pretty much made that the main point. I never said Star couldn't fight without the wand. But in that scene, she DID need the wand because otherwise Marco was screwed, Pony Head was screwed, and basically all of Mewni was screwed. It's canon that Star relies on her wand far more than her strength. That's her strong point; that's why Marco is the karate kid, not Star.

I don't own Star vs. the Forces of Evil.

GENERAL POV

"Come on, Marco," Star pleaded softly, clasping her hands in front of her and giving him puppy dog eyes. "You know they want to meet you."

Marco grimaced and glanced away, gazing down at the grass under his feet as he struggled to come up with a response. "I don't know, Star. I'm not…I'm still not really human."

Star waved her wand at him with a raised eyebrow. "Yeah, but as soon as I find the right spell we can fix all of that. They don't even have to know if you don't want them to."

"How am I supposed to explain where I've been all these years?" Marco protested, furrowing his eyebrows. "How do you just…tell your parents that you were kidnapped by a demon? They're never going to accept that; I was basically raised as a monster, Star."

Star bit her lip and descended the front steps quietly, placing a hand on his shoulder. "Marco, if I can get over it, so can your parents."

Marco swallowed and lifted his eyes to her before nodding hesitantly. "Okay. Okay, let's go."

Star bounced on her toes happily and vaulted up the steps, grabbing the doorknob and pushing the door open with a flourish. "Oh Mr. and Mrs. Diiiiiaaaaazzzz!" she called out, practically dragging Marco in over the threshold.

Marco winced and pulled his wrist from her grasp, almost melting into the woodwork. "Star, I don't-"

"Star? What is it, honey?" came Mrs. Diaz's voice from the kitchen. "Have you been out all night?"

Star blinked and suddenly seemed to realize that it was barely eight in the morning, the sun filtering in through the curtains of the living room and the smell of bacon permeating the house.

"Uhhh…apparently!" she called back. "But can you come out here for a second?"

Marco gulped and shrank back against the wall, watching with apprehension as Angie stepped into the living room, wiping her hands on a dishtowel. Her hair was pulled into a large and sloppy bun, a wooden spoon was tucked over one ear, and she was wearing a t-shirt and sweats.

She looked…she looked like a mom.

Marco felt his breath hitch in his throat and he practically whimpered, making the woman glance over at him in surprise. The startled look on her face melted into one of thoughtfulness and her eyes searched Marco carefully, tracing over his face and finally landing on his eyes, chocolate brown colliding with emerald green.

Angela swallowed hard and looked back at Star, fingers clenching together as she struggled not to jump to conclusions. "Star, honey…when you left last night you said…"

"That I was going to get your son back," Star confirmed softly, a smile sitting on the edge of her lips. "Yeah."

Angie pressed a hand to her forehead and stepped over to Marco slowly, pausing when the boy sank back even further into the wall, if that was possible. He looked almost terrified, but his eyes held something akin to longing as they stared at one another.

She finally worked up the nerve to lift a palm to his face and stroked her thumb slowly over his cheekbone, and Marco found himself leaning into the soothing touch, the lump in his throat growing.

"Are you really…? I mean I thought when I ran into you in the nursery that you might…but…?"

She trailed off, not sure how to finish the sentence, and Marco gave her a shaky smile, pressing his hands back against the wall to move himself forwards ever so slightly. "Yeah," he murmured with a nod.

"It makes sense," Star interrupted, rocking on her heels. "He was taken around the same time, and we had someone from Mewni confirm it for us, and-"

"Mewni?" Angie repeated in confusion, her eyebrows furrowing. "What were you two doing on Mewni?"

She turned her gaze back to Marco and studied him for another moment. "And what do you…I mean….do you know who took you?"

He flinched a bit and Angie frowned, her eyes filling with anger. "Who was it? Did you call someone? Star, how did you find him?"

The woman was now looking between the two teenagers anxiously, her fingers still cupping Marco's cheek. He looked at Star pleadingly and the girl just shook her head.

Scratch everything that had just happened. She was so dead.

"He got taken by this reptilian demon named Toffee," Star explained, ignoring Marco's glares. "This fortune teller told him that the only way he could defeat me was to steal Marco, so he did, and then he raised Marco to think he was evil and want to kill me, and so that's how we met, except I didn't know that, but then Marco and I figured out that he was your kid and he confronted Toffee and then-"

"Star," Marco snapped, his eyes filled with anxiety and his hands rubbing up and down his arms. "Please."

The girl shut her mouth and glanced down at the floor. "Anyway," she mumbled at the carpet. "Toffee's…he's gone now."

Angie knew she was missing something important, something big, but she wasn't going to pry. Instead, she turned back to Marco and lifted her other hand so that she was now cupping both of his cheeks in her fingers. "So you really are-?"

He gave her a tiny grin and Angela smiled shakily, pulling the boy into a tight embrace, burying her head into his shoulder, and struggling not to cry.

Marco jumped ever so slightly at the physical contact but slowly found himself relaxing into the embrace, lifting his arms to clutch at the woman's back and pressing tightly against her, shivering when he felt her brush a tender hand through his hair and rumple it. "You're okay," she choked out.

Something burned in Marco's eyes and chest and he took a shuddering breath. "Yeah," he whispered back, shutting his eyes and tucking his head against her. "Yeah. I am."

Angie pulled away slightly and stroked Marco's bangs from his forehead, a sad smile on her face. "I missed so much," she realized, her eyes watering. "I'm…so sorry, Marco."

He choked up again at the sound of his name and shook his head. "It's okay," he promised her, letting his arms drift down to his sides. "It…wasn't your fault."

Angie smiled thinly. "Still."

Star coughed softly and they turned to look at her. "Where's Mr. Diaz?"

Angie frowned, glancing towards the door. "He uh…he already left for work. I could call him, get him to come back home."

Marco shook his head. "It's okay," he promised her. "I can wait a little bit longer. I've already waited fourteen years."

Mrs. Diaz swallowed hard and pressed her hands gently to Marco's cheeks, smiling when he didn't flinch or step away. "Are you hungry? Can I make you kids anything to eat?"

Marco smiled and shook his head, reaching up to clasp his mother's fingers in his own. "Thanks, but no thanks. I'm just really tired; I think I'll nap, if that's okay with you."

Angie nodded and squeezed his hand gently before forcing herself to pull away and gesturing up the stairs. "You can uh…stay in the guest ro-well, technically it's your room…if you'd like it."

She twisted the hem of her shirt anxiously in her fingers and chewed on her lower lip, trying hard not to grab hold of him again. Marco ducked his head and grinned at the floor, swallowing hard. "I'd like that a lot," he whispered, hugging himself tightly and glancing sideways at his mother. "Thank you."

Angie nodded and Star took the cue to grab Marco's elbow and gently tug him up the stairs, their feet clattering loudly in the sudden quiet of the house.

"Why don't we get rid of that arm?" Star asked, tilting her head thoughtfully. "I think you might feel better if we did."

Marco bobbed his head instantly and followed Star into her room for the first time, nearly tripping over his own two feet in utter shock at how massive the area was. It didn't look nearly that big from the outside, although the tower was kind of a dead giveaway that a princess lived there.

Star ignored everything in the room and went straight to her bed, collapsing onto the floor and wriggling under the frame to pull out a massive book that was covered in dust and dirt and littered with tears. She pulled it open as if it didn't weigh a thing and began flipping through the pages quickly, her eyebrows furrowed.

"Monster arm, monster arm, where is the monster arm spell?" she muttered under her breath, sliding over a little as Marco sank down next to her and began scanning the pages himself.

It took nearly an hour, and a lot of coughing from the rising dust, but they finally managed to locate the reversal to the monster arm spell that Star assumed Toffee had used.

"Okay," Star said, getting to her feet and grabbing her wand as she dragged Marco over towards the more open area of the room. "You sure about this?"

Marco nodded quickly. "Do I need to have the arm transformed to do it?"

Star glanced back at the book and nodded, and watched silently as Marco flexed his fingers. The tentacle grew more slowly than usual, as if it knew it wasn't coming back, but it finally finished extending and Marco held the arm out, studying it almost fondly for a moment.

"I know that it's pretty much evil," Marco admitted softly, "but it technically is a part of me."

Star raised an eyebrow at him, lowering her wand to her side. "Then are you sure you want to-?"

"Yes," he snapped urgently. "I don't…I can't have my parents…"

He swallowed and glanced away, his tentacle twitching and tensing, and his left hand clenched at his side. Star smiled gently and twisted the wand in her fingers. "Marco, regardless of what happened to you, I think your mom and dad will just be happy that you're back, and that you're safe."

Marco shrugged, running his hand through his hair. "Still. It's…a reminder of things that I don't want to remember. I'd rather it be gone…as useful as it can be sometimes."

Star giggled and lifted the wand again, aiming it at the tentacle and squinting one eye shut so that she could see better. "Reverse in maledictionem, levate incantatores, et in brachio extento et in tota!"

The force from her wand actually shoved Star back a few steps as a blinding white and purple light spun from the center star and swirled vibrantly around Marco's monster arm. He jolted as it hit and flung his hand over his eyes to keep from being blinded.

"Is it working?" Star called out, bracing her feet against the rug to keep from sliding further.

Neither of them could really see anything, so Marco was forced to rely on how his body itself felt. But he could feel the arm shrinking, albeit slowly, and a smile slid across his face despite everything.

"I think so!"

Star took another step back, her fingers beginning to hurt from clenching onto the wand so hard, and she was about to call out to Marco again when he screamed.

It was a soul shattering, tear jerking scream that Star hadn't heard from him even when he got stabbed, and it scared the absolute shit out of her. She instantly called off the spell, stumbling once again as the magic was sucked back into the wands core, and she watched in utter shock as Marco collapsed to the floor clutching his right arm to his chest, tears streaming down his face.

The monster arm was burnt beyond recognition.

Lol whoops. Blame Flavia (don't blame my child I love her; she just gave me inspiration).

The incantation was Latin for "Reverse the curse, end the spell, leave the arm whole and well" because I am not creative and yes I used Google Translate so it's probably not right haha.