Catra's arm trembled underneath her as she held herself up by it. Her legs were spread above her, assisting in keeping her balance as the Force swirled around her. A rock floated through the air, settling on top of a pile of rocks she was holding up with the Force. She steadied them, taking a moment to make sure they were stable before moving her attention to the next rock in the line.

She still hadn't been able to get Razz's words out of her head. The old woman's rambling had affected her more than she'd care to admit. It was Adora. It was always Adora. She didn't even know why. They had no contact since she'd accepted Vader's offer. Adora should be the last thing on her mind.

And yet.

The rocks wobbled slightly, her concentration slipped. Her brow furrowed, and she tightened her grip on the rocks. They stabilized again, allowing her to keep stacking them.

Vader's presence washed over her. He had returned from his time with Perfuma a few hours earlier than expected. Since returning, he had spent most of his time on the ship. Catra knew something had happened during his time away. The way his presence created swirling eddies in the Force told her that much.

"You are doing well with this exercise." His voice rumbled around her.

"It's easy," Catra said as she floated another rock onto the pile. It was almost as tall as her now, with each rock being progressively bigger than the last. A small smirk adorned her face as she spoke again. "I could do this in my sleep."

A wave of Force crashed into her. She cried out as she toppled to the ground, her rock tumbling after her. "What was that for?"

"A lesson in humility, my apprentice," Vader said. With a wave of his hand, the rocks floated back into a neat line. "I have something I need to discuss with you."

Catra dusted herself off as she stood. "Could have just asked."

"Perhaps," Vader folded his arms across his chest. "Never the less, I have a question for you dealing with your time in the Horde."

"You seem more well informed about them than I am."

"There are still things I am not aware of. Most of my knowledge is second hand, from either Perfuma or Razz. That and comparing my observations with my time in the Empire."

Catra nodded as she shuffled her feet. "I don't know how much more I know. Didn't pay attention much."

"You were still raised there. You might surprise yourself with the knowledge you hold."

"Maybe." Catra ran a hand through her hair. She was telling the truth about her memories of the Horde. She spent most of her time with Adora. And most of Adora's time was spent training. Either that or exploring the Fright Zone, which had always been Catra's favorite thing. "What did you need to know?"

"What would the Horde do if they captured two of the Rebellions Princesses?"

"Is that what happened at your thing with Perfuma?" Catra's smirk was back, mostly at the thought of the Princesses being bought down a peg. "Who'd they capture?"

"Does it matter?"

"Eh, kinda." Catra waved her hand slightly. "Last I heard, they had focused on the Brightmoon Princess, don't know her name. The others were still talked about, but most of the Horde was directed to her. I think because the Rebellion was established in Brightmoon."

Vader tilted his head to look out into the forest. "And if she was the one they managed to capture?"

"Public execution." Catra shrugged. "I know the higher-ups liked to make a big deal of our victories. Though they hid the fact that rebellion would often take back the villages we took."

"Most of those who rule by fear do not wish for their failure to be well known." His gaze returned to Catra. "Do you know how soon they would be set up for a prisoner execution?"

She shook her head. "The Horde didn't actually capture many rebellion soldiers, let alone princesses." Her eyes narrowed. "What happened at the thing you went to?"

Vader stayed silent, his gaze never wavering from Catra. Morai hooted from her perch, her feathers puffing out in warning. "Someone is coming."

Catra closed her eyes and stretched out with the Force. She could sense who Vader was talking about on the very edge of her senses. A large, bright presence nearly drowned out the others. She recognized Perfuma by the way the woods reach out, like a child looking for their mother.

"Get inside the ship," Vader said.

"Not happening."

Vader's black lenses turned to her, reflecting her determined glare at her. "This is not a debate. If they were to discover you were from the Horde…"

"Adora was from the Horde. They accepted her."

"And if that line of reasoning does not work?"

"If Adora's with them, it'll work," Catra smirked and shrugged. "If she's not, then they don't have anyone that could capture me."

"Adora will not be with them," Vader said a ship rose above the treetops. Its blue hull blended with the sky, the sliver trimmings being the only thing that delineated the outline of the ship. Its sail was at half-mast as it circled the clearing twice before lowering down across from her and Vader.

A ramp lowered down from the side of the ship. Catra recognized two of the people that walked down it. Perfuma was easy since she was wearing the same outfit as when they had first met. The other person was from the assault on Thaymor. His eyes widened when they landed on her. Apparently, he recognized her as well.

She smirked at him and waved for extra effect as the rest of the group exited the ship. One of them stood out. She towered over the group, the folded gossamer wings adding to her height. Her clothes looked expensive, the smooth cloth draping over her body. Long, pink and purple hair cascaded down her back, held back by intricate chains attached to a small gem on her forehead.

The last three weren't interesting by Catra's standards. Two girls, one with long light purple hair, pulled into twin ponytails on either side of her head and wearing stained overalls. The other girl wore a dark blueish-green jumpsuit with gold trimming and seemed to have a permanent scowl on her face. A stark contrast to the smiling man who bounded down the ramp after her.

The tall woman took the lead, gliding over to Vader, her head tilted up as she regarded him. He returned her stare, his mechanical breathing filling the surrounding area. "To what do I owe the pleasure of your company, your Majesty." Vader's voice caused most of the group to flinch, excluding Perfuma, the ponytail girl, and the woman currently in a staring contest with him.

She sounded just like Catra expected, clipped and haughty, like she was talking down at you. "I'd heard you were present during the recent attack at the All Princess Ball?"

"I was," Vader tilted his head to the side. "I fail to see why that requires a social visit from the Queen of Brightmoon."

The Queen's gaze locked onto Catra. "It has to do with your apprentice, Catra."

Catra opened her mouth to speak, but Vader stepped in front of her, obscuring her view of the group. "What do you want with my apprentice?"

"Wait," The boy from Thaymor pointed at her when she poked her head around Vader's cloak, "You're Catra? You attacked a village."

Catra grinned and nodded. "And Adora destroyed the five tanks I was assigned. Your point?"

"You electrocuted her."

"Please, she'd taken harder hits than that in training. You shot me with one of your net arrow things." Catra rubbed her side in mock hurt. "Had a bruise for a week from it."

"Cause you were-"

"That is enough, Bow." The Queen said, pinning the now named Bow with a glare. "We are not here to antagonize them." Bow looked down, lowering his head as he stepped back. Though he threw another glare at Catra.

"You still have not answered my question." Vader crossed his arms, his elbows pushing out his cloak. "What is your business with my apprentice?"

Instead of an answer, the Queen's eyes were locked onto the lightsaber hanging from Vader's belt. Her gaze flickered over to Catra as well, widening as she saw her lightsaber. "I- Forgive me, Master Jedi," she said with a deep bow. "I didn't realize-"

"Your deference is not needed, even if I was still a Jedi."

Silence reigned in the clearing as the Queen's group stared at her and Vader. Moirai hooted faintly, swooping in from the woods to alight on her perch between the two groups. The Queen rose from her bow, her eyes narrowed. "If you aren't a Jedi…"

"Neither am I a Sith," Vader stepped forward and pointed at the Queen with his gloved hand. "You would do well to cease your wild speculations."

"Ignite your lightsaber then," the Queen said, her wings unfurling as she rose to her full height. "That should clear up any wild speculations."

Vader tilted his head as he held his hand out to his side. His lightsaber smacked into his palm, igniting with a snap-hiss. The red blade bathed them in an angry glare, the low growl of the lightsaber drowning out everything else. The Queen took a step back, her eyes widening as sparkly purple magic pooled in her hands.

Perfume stepped between them, her shoulders back and her arms crossed as she glared at the Queen. "We are not here to fight."

A scowl twisted the Queen's face. "You do not understand. The Sith-"

"Are gone." Vader interrupted her as he crossed his blade in front of him. "I destroyed them."

"Then why is your blade still red? Only the Sith used that color."

"It takes more than a changed mindset to heal the trauma of the Darkside."

"And what of the Jedi?"

"They survive." He turned off his lightsaber, attaching it once more to his belt. "Though any of the Jedi you would have known are long since dead."

The Queen's nostrils flared as she opened her mouth to speak, only to be interrupted by Bow. "Can we get back on track here? If we're going to save Adora and Glimmer-"

"What?"

Catra's interjection silenced Bow. Every eye was turned to her now as she stepped out of Vader's shadow. She stalked towards Bow, invading his personal space as she glared up at him. For credit, he didn't flinch, though his hands clenched at his sides.

"What do you mean save Adora?" Catra asked, growling out the words as she bared her teeth in a scowl. "For your sake, it better not mean what I think it does."

"I'm afraid it does." The Queen's voice broke over the two of them, causing them to look at her. "Adora, along with my daughter, were both taken by the Horde during the All Princess Ball."

Catra seethed, her claws digging into her palms as her tail thrashed behind her. First, they took away her Adora, now they lost her. She closed her eyes, blowing out a long breath as she stepped back, attempting to sink herself into the Force to calm down.

It didn't work.

"What the hell!" The words exploded out of her, the Force now matching her turbulent emotions. She waved her hand at the others in the group. "You have how many horde-dammed princesses now and you still lost?"

Bow stepped forward, brow furrowing. "It wasn't that simple-"

"Oh, really crop-top? I have to ask then, how many soldiers were there?" She tilted her head, smirking up at him.

Bow shuffled his feet, his hand coming up to rub at his arm. "Two," he said, his voice nearing a whisper.

"Two?" Catra blinked. "Two? That's it?"

"They surprised us at the Ball. None of us had our weapons ready-"

"And how did that work out for you?"

The princess with the dark green hair pulled Bow back, stepping between him and Catra. "Hey, we did our best."

"And that wasn't good enough."

"Back off. You weren't there."

Catra scoffed. "You're right, cause I wouldn't have let two people steal my friends." She ignored the irony in that statement, since she had lost Adora in very similar circumstances. Adora had left voluntarily, though, which made all the difference in her mind.

"Yeah, right," the green-haired girl said with a roll of her eyes. "Says the girl hiding in the woods. Do you even know how to fight?"

"Better than you."

Vader's hand settles on Catra's shoulder at the same time the Queen pulled the other girl away. "If all you came here to do is insult me and my apprentice, consider your job accomplished. You may leave now."

Vader's presence pushed down on them in the Force. The fur on Catra's body stood on end at the feeling. It was the same as it had been when they had first met. Though now its oppressive nature wasn't directed at her. In fact, she leaned into it.

The rest of them weren't so lucky. They looked at each other as they shivered, each of them shifting in a slight fighting stance. The Queen's eyes narrowed at Vader and she flared her aura in response. Light and dark clashed in the Force, replacing the pressure in the air with crackling energy.

"Stop, both of you!" Perfuma yelled. Her hands were clenched at her sides, the forest pulling at her as she flexed her power. "This isn't what we came for." She turned to Catra. "We need your help."

Catra took a step back, her gaze sweeping over the group again. They were all watching her, except for the green-haired girl, with the same pleading gaze. She racked her brain, trying to come up with a reason they would come to her. It came down to Adora being gone. "You need someone who knows the Horde, don't you?"

The silence after her question was enough of an answer. She growled and turned on her heel, stalking back onto Vader's ship as she tuned out whatever conversation broke out behind her. As soon as she was out of sight, she leaned against a wall, her claws digging into the metal as she let out a shuddering breath.

Adora was in trouble. Captured by the Horde. Catra wasn't sure what they would do with her. Would they consider her a traitor or something else? It would probably depend on whether Hordak or Shadow Weaver got to her first.

A part of Catra ached to go after her. The same part that remembered the promise they made to each other years ago. The promise Adora had shattered when she left for the rebellion.

Razz's words floated to the front of her mind. "By this point previously, you would have both left each other. Now though? That you must decide for yourself."

Except it wasn't that easy. Another voice whispered in her ear, sounding like Shadow Weaver when she was manipulating Adora. "Leave her. She left you, abandoned you. Why should you do any different? It's because of her you're no longer part of the Horde."

"She missed you." Bow voice caused Catra to whip around, igniting her lightsaber and holding it to his throat.

"You shouldn't be here. Get out."

Bow raised his hands but made no other move to leave. "I just want to talk."

Catra gritted her teeth together, her grip tightening around her lightsaber. The Weaver voice spoke to her again. Telling her to send him away, that he wasn't worth listening to. That she should strike him down for taking what was hers.

She pushed back at the voice. If there was one thing she was sure of, especially now after her life had been upturned, it was that she never wanted to be like Shadow Weaver. She stood straight, lowering her blade as she schooled her features.

"What do you have to say, then?"

He slowly lowered his hands, though he still eyed her blue blade. "You were right. We need your help. We don't have the right intel to pull off a mission in the Fright Zone."

"We've already established that," Catra said with a roll of her eyes. "What would you need from me?"

"Information." He sighed, rubbing at his temples. "I'm not presumptuous enough to ask you to come with. I don't know exactly what went down between you and Adora."

"You were there for most of it."

He ignored her. "But she needs you. We need you." He took a step forward, pinning her with a determined look in his eyes. "You were raised in the Fright Zone. You probably know it better than anyone."

The corner of her mouth turned up in a slight smile. "That's an understatement. Adora and I explored every part of that place."

He returned her grin before shaking his head. "Exactly. If we could know some good ways to get in, it would make the mission far easier."

Her eyes narrowed as she turned off her lightsaber and leaned against the wall. "And if I don't give you the information?"

"Then we'll go, anyway." His response was instant and sure. His face hardening as he straightened his posture. "We are going to get our friends back. The Horde isn't taking anything else."

She raised an eyebrow at that. Resolved wafted off him in the Force, filling the space between them. It was something new to her. She was only just understanding all the things she would sense about a person. And right now she could tell that Bow was telling her the truth. He was fully prepared to go into a mission blind to rescue his friends. It stirred something inside her. A reminder of the promise she and Adora had made to each other. What it truly meant.

"I'm not giving you information."

Bow deflated the bright light he made, dimming as his shoulders slumped.

"I'm coming with you."

His eyes widened and backed up, flailing his hands. "I didn't want to pressure you-"

"You didn't." She pushed off from the wall, walking over to poke him in the chest with her finger. "I make my own decisions. No one else."

He nodded so fast she was sure his head would fly off. "Right, yeah, of course.' His gaze flicked back to the hilt in her hand. "You know, I never thought I'd get to see a lightsaber in person. Let alone be threatened by one."

"You know about..." she trailed off, lifting the hilt in her hand.

"Yeah, well," Bow rubbed the back of his head with his hand as he looked down. "My... parents own the biggest library in Etheria. They have a few books on Jedi and other Force users."

"Alright, Arrow Boy," she brushed past him, heading to her room. "Why don't you get the rest of your Alliance buddies? We've wasted enough time as it is."

She turned away before he could say anything else. She entered her room, her gaze falling on her cloak which was folded up at the foot of the extravagent bed that took up most of the room. As she grabbed it and threw it over her shoulders, Vader's breathing intruded into her thoughts.

"If you're going to try and talk me out of this, don't," she said as she turned to face him.

"I find it curious. You have been so against the idea of Adora." He stepped into the room, ducking under the door frame to accommodate his height. "What has changed?"

Catra chewed on her lip, turning her face away from Vader to stare at her unmade bed. Thin scratches, matching the ones she and Adora had made together in their bed, stared back at her from the headboard. "I... It... I made a promise when we were kids..." she trailed off, her focus still on the scratched faces.

Vader's hand resting on her shoulder broke her from her self-induced trance. "I can understand the power of such promises. Are you sure this is the right time for it?"

She huffed, "No clue... But if not now, when? Like Razz said, we're fated, right?" She looked up into the black lenses on his helmet.

"You always have a choice." He let his hand fall back to his side. "And if you are too late, do anything?"

What would she do if they were too late? A dozen different images flashed through her mind. A tumultuous cacophony of every too-late scenario she could imagine. She closed her eyes, turning her head away as she tried to push back against them. "I don't know, but I have to be there at least. try to... try to help."

Vader stayed silent, his head tilted to the side as he regarded her. Finally, he spoke, his voice as low and soft as he could make it with its mechanical timbre. "I must warn. If you go through with this course of action... It may test you in ways you are not ready for."

"That's not going to stop me."

"I did not intend it to," He said, crossing his arms. "I can recognize that this is something you have to do." His hand found her shoulder again. "And you will not do it alone." Before she could plan a response, he had turned and marched out of the room, his cloak billowing behind him. "Gather the others. That ship they have is ill-suited for our purposes."

A shaky breath escaped Catra's lip. She hadn't even realized she was holding it. Her expectations for how Vader would react to her running off to help Adora was destroyed now. She didn't know how to deal with this acceptance, so she pushed it to the back of her mind. With a shake of her head, she left the ship, striding down the ramp with laid-back confidence that she did not have at the moment.

Their group had huddled closer together, talking in whispers that made Catra's ears twitch. Morai had found a new perch on the purple-haired girl's head, preening smugly as the girl's ponytails stroked her feathers. As Catra approached, they all fell silent and turned to face her.

"You ready to go?" Bow asked with a friendly smile.

"There's been a change of plans." Catra let a smirk slide onto her face as his expression fell. She had nearly forgotten how fun it was to mess with other people, especially when they responded as Bow did. "I won't be going with you."

The green-haired girl pushed herself to the front of the group, stomping up to Catra with a scowl on her face. "Really! We came all this way for you to pull this wishy-washy crap."

Catra tilted her head as she looked up at the girl. Her smirk turned into a full-blown grin. "Oh, I'm still going to save Adora." She pointed to the shiny ship they had come in. "I'm just not going in that."

The mustached man let out a dramatic gasp at Catra's words. We're all these people so easy to mess with? "How dare you? My ship is the finest-"

He was interrupted when a low bone-shaking whine cause everyone's eyes to widen. The whine rose in volume, deepening into a dull roar that drowned out every other sound. The trees bent and waved at the exhaust as a bright blue glow lit up the circular engines and licked up the long tails that protruded from them.

The Queen stepped forward, yelling to be heard over the sound. "You expect up to get on a ship with a Sith?"

Catra shrugged. "I don't expect anything from you. I'm going with Vader to rescue my friend. You can come with me or not. I don't care." She turned on her heel and headed back to the ship. It seemed at least some of them didn't care about the Sith thing the Queen was hung up on, given the sound of scrambling footsteps behind her.

A/N: I still don't know how I feel about this chapter. Sometimes the characters just don't want to cooperate. Gave me headaches for about half of it, but it is done. Still love writing Vader and Catra though. Anyway, hope y'all enjoyed it, and I'll see you in the future!