Chapter Text
Adora
Adora got off the bus with Bow and Glimmer, chatting about something dumb, they all had their BrightMoon Soccer shirts on. Adora was wearing her's along with her good pair of sweat pants, which looked much nicer than her normal sweat pants. They walked into their school and couldn't help but notice the flyers and banners that decorated their hallways.
Beat the Horde! Home Game @ 7 pm
Come Witness the Battle of BrightMoon! Soccer Game tonight!
We're gonna win! Come see us win on the soccer field!
"Wow, I always forget how hyped everyone gets when we play a game against the Horde," Glimmer said as she made her way towards the lockers. She quickly spun the dial, and her locker clicked open. She lazily threw her soccer bag in there, and it barely managed to fit. She struggled to close her door, but after a few seconds, it securely closed itself.
"They have been our rivals for decades," Bow commented, " So, of course, we want to win,"
Adora scoffed as the three began to make their way towards the direction of her and bows locker, "I just want to win so I can shove it in Catra's face,"
The other two people in the trio gave each other a look. They knew that this game was more personal to Adora, especially with how things ended with Catra. Bow became the first one to speak up, "Are you sure you're okay? I mean a lot happened with homecoming, and whatever happened at SAT Prep-"
"It's fine," Adora cut him off and proceeded to fiddle with her locker door. It took her a minute but she finally got it open. She gently placed her soccer bag on the hook and then closed her locker with ease.
"Are you sure?" Glimmer chimed in, her voice sang with concern. It caught Adora off guard a bit, but she quickly snapped back and gave Glimmer a confident nod.
"I am sure," Adora said as she watched Bow put his soccer bag in his locker along with his archery bag, his robotics club stuff, and he still had room to close it. Adora could swear Bow was a magician because the fact that he could close his locker was a magic trick.
Bow seemed like he was about to add something else to the conversation, but his phone rang with a text message. He gave a small sigh as he relayed the news to his friends, " Your mom wants to meet with the team before class, so we better start heading over there."
Glimmer gave a loud and dramatic groan, "Come on Mom, some of us have to turn in papers before class,"
"If you had just finished it one time then you wouldn't have to turn it in before class," Bow gave her a little smirk as he grabbed her hand and pulled her towards the coaches' office.
Adora followed along, but she couldn't focus on anything. In fact, the whole meeting was a blur because she was so busy focusing on Catra. The events of homecoming and that night at the prep office, they played over and over in her mind.
"Hey, Adora," The tan girl said as she played with one of her brunette curls. She had a devious smile, but Adora was struggling not to smile back. Her eyes shined with deception, but Adora elected to ignore that because she needed answers.
"Why are you here?" Adora's voice had such a subtle need. Her longing broke through in her tone, and maybe that's why Catra responded the way she did.
"Can't a girl ask her old friend to dance?" She moved her hand so that it grabbed hers, her long and sharp nails brushed over Adora's palms as she so, sending shivers down the blonde's spine.
"It's a slow dance," Adora stated. The dance floor was littered with duos, and she knew the song being played was specifically meant for couples.
"So?" Catra said before dragging Adora to the dance floor. She let her hands lay on her hip and shoulder. She looked into Adora's eyes as they shined under the cheap disco lights the school rented. She smiled as Adora started to follow her lead, stepping along to the beat with her.
"Why are you doing this?" Adora asked, she slowly placed her hands around Catra's waist, feeling the material that made up her suit. Adora never got a chance to truly appreciate the outfit, but up close she could see how it really fit Catra. She honestly didn't know why she ever thought she would show up wearing a dress when this suit seemed like the obvious choice for her.
"Does everything I do have to be part of some mind game?" Catra twirled Adora around. She watched the way her dress flowed with her and how it enhanced every movement Adora made. Once Adora ended her spin Catra continued whispering the rest of her statement into Adora's ear, "Maybe I just want to see you,"
Adora lost all the breath in her lungs, but it quickly returned when she took another moment to think about the situation, "So you snuck into our homecoming just to see me?"
"I didn't sneak in," Catra said as a small grin formed on her face, "I came as a plus one,"
"You managed to get in on a technicality," Adora said, she didn't want to focus on the fact that Catra came with a date. She had no idea what Scorpia meant to her, but it made Adora feel weird whenever she saw them together.
"Maybe I just wanted to come here, and give you a chance to apologize," Catra said as she quicked the movement of her feet. The song was about to come to its crescendo. Everyone around them seemed to realize it as well as they prepared to finish the dance.
"Apologize for what?" Adora asked, she then heard the song about to end. She didn't realize how long they had been dancing, and just as the music was about to come to a halt, she felt Catra pull her into a dip.
Her green and blue eyes looked down at her; they seemed to be hiding something. Adora might have been able to figure it out of she wasn't so busy holding onto Catra's shoulders, scared that she might fall out of the dip. That's when Catra whispered to her one word, a word that rang in her mind days after the dance, " Everything,"
That's when Adora was lifted from the dip. She was about to say something to Catra when a loud crash could be heard coming from the locker room hallway. Then someone unplugged the DJ booth; Adora could see blonde hair by the cord that she was sure was Kyle. She then heard people cheering, "Go Horde!" Before clammering out the school doors.
Adora looked at Catra who was laughing, "I can't believe I was able to distract you for that long," She ran her fingers through her hair as she started towards the door, " That was fun. I had a good time messing with you, see you later."
With that, the girl was gone, and all she left in her wake was a trashed locker room and some defaced posters.
"Adora," The sound of Coach Angella calling her name snapped her back into reality. She focused on the coach who was towering over her, arms crossed, "Are you ready to focus?"
"Yes Ma'am," Adora said as she looked at the strategy board. She was placed as a forward with Frosta, per-usual. Mermista and Sea-hawk were their Mid-fielders. Bow, Glimmer, and Perfuma were their defensive squad. Entrapta, was goalie because she played so well it was like she had multiple hands.
Angella nodded and then continued on. She discussed how Adora would mostly focus on how Catra was a notorious ball hog and how she could use that to their advantage.
"You just have to jockey her so Mermista and Sea-hawk can overwhelm her," Angella said as she drew lines on the board, "Can you do that?"
Adora nodded her head with enthusiasm. She was prepared to go head to head with Catra and was ready to see the look on her face when she realizes Horde High is going down.
With that explained, they all went to class. Adora had Freshman English with Bow as her first class. She tried so hard but found it was difficult to focus on Hamlet when the biggest game of the year was just a few hours away. Plus, she was only a few hours away from seeing all her old classmates... and Catra.
She pulled out her phone and hid it in her book. She looked at Catra in her contacts, with their last message being from over a month ago. Adora didn't know why but she never bothered to block this contact. She just always had a feeling that someday Catra would text her and she would say sorry.
"Don't text her," Bow said from the desk beside her. He was highlighting the important parts of the scene and barely looked up at Adora when he talked, " You know it will just cause drama."
"I wasn't going to text her," Adora let out a scoff as she turned her phone off. She wouldn't be dumb enough to provoke something like that right before a game.
"But you were thinking about it," Bow said before closing his copy of the Shakespearian play, "Level with me. You have been thinking about her since you talked to her at SAT Prep, haven't you."
"Ya," Adora muttered. She hated that she couldn't get over it, but all the things that her ex-friend said to her got into her head. Maybe that was the point, but Adora felt there was something more to her words.
"You gotta tell someone what happened, or how do you expect us to help you?" Bow asked.
"If I tell you, then you'll think I'm a bad person," Adora looked away from the boy next to her, then was surprised to see his hand resting on hers, and a comforting smile to go along with it.
"I promise I won't judge you,"
Adora took a deep breath and started her story.
Bow
"She caught me as I was walking home," Adora started, " She offered me a granola bar. It was the same one that we used to bring when we wandered the neighborhood. It tasted like childhood, which I guess is why we started to talk about ours. We have both been in the system since birth, never knowing anything else. We meet when we got put in a group home, Catra was there because she was a trouble maker, and I was there because I tried to run away too many times."
Adora took a moment before she decided to continue; she really didn't want to talk about the next part, "We talked about how we both decided to sign up for soccer together. How we would run around the home almost breaking everything... then we talked about this one volunteer Miss Weaver. Me and Catra called her Shadow Weaver because of how awful she was. She always seemed to like me though, she would tell me how I was destined for greatness. I always ignored her, but..."
Adora now had to stop her breath from shaking as she kept on, "Catra told me what she did to her. She would hit her, hurt her, and then tell her she was worthless. She said that once she even threatened to kill her," Adora grabbed the sides of her head as if to keep it from flying off as she confessed to Bow, " She told me that when I left, I left her alone to deal with all that. You wanna know what else! Shadow Weaver works at Horde High... I left her when she needed me most."
Bow was in shock as he heard what Adora told him. He tried to think rationally about this and suggested to Adora what she could do, "Okay, you need to report this lady. We can report what Catra said to the police and-"
"And then they will remove Catra from the home," Adora said, "Plus, there is a chance that they won't believe her... they rarely believe the trouble kids."
Bow shook his head. He couldn't wrap his mind around why they couldn't help more, but Adora seemed to be reading his mind and answered his question, "She doesn't want me to do anything about it. Trust me I want to..."
They both sat in silence for the rest of the class. Once the bell rang they both went their separate ways. Bow tried to process the recent information as he made his way to his tech class. He threw his bag onto his desk, and like clockwork, Entrapta came up to talk to him.
Entrapta was an interesting girl who usually drove people away once they realized she didn't want to talk about anything but her experiments. She didn't come off as a tech geek either because her purple pigtails and soccer shirt said that she was some punky jock, but in reality, she was usually thinking about her newest inventions.
She started to ramble about her latest robotic contraption, but Bow tuned her out. Usually, he would listen to her, and he did enjoy their conversations, but this time Bow's mind was occupied. He kept thinking about what Adora told him, and he felt awful doing nothing.
He brought out his phone and quickly texted his Dads.
Bow: Hey Dads, after the game I need to talk to you about something. I need to get advice.
Dad: Alright. Is it something serious?
Daddio: We can pick you up if we need too.
Bow: No need to pick me up. I just wanted you to know I wanted to talk about something.
Dad: Okay. Tell us if you need anything else.
Bow was about to type something else when Entrapta said something that caught his attention.
"You're not listening anymore, are you?" She asked with a tone that bordered on curiosity and disappointment. Her face showed what she was thinking; that this was inevitable, he was going to get tired of her eventually.
"Oh, I am sorry, Entrapta. I just have a lot on my mind today," Bow said as he put down his phone. Showing the purple-haired girl that he was now paying complete attention too her.
"Oh! Is it the game? Don't worry about that, because I know we are going to win," Entrapta said it with such confidence. Nevermind the fact that Brightmoon hadn't won a game against Horde High in ten years.
"Ya... its the game I'm worried about," Bow lied, and he hoped Entrapta didn't catch onto it. She didn't and continued to talk about how they would win the game.
"You see now that we have Adora, the Horde lost their most valuable player. Also, with you and Glimmer on defense, you will be an almost unstoppable force!" Entrapta continued on why everyone's positions made it so that they had the best possible chance of winning the game. She probably wouldn't have stopped if the teacher, Miss Castaspella, hadn't walked into the room.
"Alright, class! Today we will learn about Binary Code," Castaspella started to write notes down on the board. You wouldn't peg her as a tech teacher, because she looked like a modern fortune teller. Her long hair with her purple maxi dress and golden headband made it seem like she was ready to sage your house. In fact, she told the class one time that she was into tarot cards, which didn't come as too much of a surprise.
Bow tried to listen to his teacher talk, but he just zoned out. He zoned out in math, then in archery as well. Suddenly, it was the end of the day, and he was in the locker room preparing for the game.
SeaHawk noticed how out of it he was and began to worry about his friend, "Hey, bro, you good,"
"Do you ever feel like your powerless?" Bow asked, he unconsciously had been waiting for someone to ask him that question. He had too many thoughts in his head and they were all about to spill out.
SeaHawk didn't seem quite ready for that question, "Umm... I guess. Are you worried about the game or-"
Bow laid down on the locker room bench as he began to spill his thoughts to SeaHawk, "I just feel horrible not doing something. I just learned something that changes my whole perspective on a person, and now I have the urge to help them, but what if they don't want my help. Do I take their word that they don't need it? Or do I trust my gut and help them even if they don't want it? What if my help makes it worse for them?"
SeaHawk stayed silent for a moment after Bow finished. He really didn't know what he was getting into when he asked Bow if he was okay, "That seems like a lot to unpack right now. How about at some point this week we'll grab Froyo and talk it out? I feel like you need that."
Bow shook his head, "No, I shouldn't even be talking about it right now," He put on his shin guards, leaving a moment of thick silence, before he continued, "Thank you for listening to my ramble there, it helped to have someone else hear my thoughts,"
"Anytime," SeaHawk said looking down at his cleats, "But you know you can talk to me about anything, right?"
"Ya, I know which is-" Bow was interrupted by a ping on his phone. It was a text from Coach Angella telling them to get to the Coaches Office immediately.
SeaHawks phone dinged with the same message. He raised an eyebrow before looking at Bow, "Wonder what she wants?"
"I think I know," Bow sighed before he started to head towards the Coaches Office, "We better go and face the music,"
Glimmer
"Mom!" Glimmer yelled, she looked so small standing in front of her mother, she came in at maybe 5'3 wearing her cleats while her mother towered above her, "You can't just take away my captain position right before a game, especially not cause of this!"
"You blatantly ignored me when I said not to retaliate against the Hordes pranks," Angella raised her voice along with her daughter, "Yet what do you do? You flooded their locker room! If they find out who did this Horde High is gonna make them pay for damages,"
"They're a private school! They should be able to pay to fix some wet floors!"
"That's not the point, Glimmer!" Angella let out a huff before turning her attention to the rest of the team, "You all should be ashamed of yourselves. This is not how BrightMoon students should act."
They all hung their head down in shame. The team knew it wasn't the high road they usually took, but after homecoming they really wanted revenge.
Mermista was the first to speak up, "They always get away with this kind of stuff. We were tired of it."
"Then beat them on the field," Angella said, "Show them that while they have been wasting their time thinking of pranks, we have been preparing for this game!"
The tall woman rubbed her temples as she let her mind wrap around what her whole soccer team did, "As a punishment, you will all come here Saturday and run laps. I expect you all to be here by 7:00 am,"
There was a large groan from the team. They all knew laps really meant killer sprints that would probably be dragged out till lunch.
Angella waved her hand to dismiss them, "Go, prepare for the game, maybe if you win I will think about easing up on your punishment,"
Everyone started to shuffle out of the room, but Angella stopped Glimmer, "I am not done talking to you."
Glimmer crossed her arms and waited for the rest of the team to leave the room. Once the last one was out, she shut the door and looked at her mother, giving her a glare that only a teen daughter could give.
Angella shot back with her own glare, " I know you want to blame me for this, but you brought this on yourself."
"So we were supposed to sit around after they trashed our locker room?"
"Yes! Because that is what I asked you to do!" Angella stopped herself and took a deep breath, " When I made you the captain of this team, I expected you to lead with your actions. I didn't expect you to come up with this outlandish idea,"
"We can't just sit around and do nothing!" Glimmer argued.
"You act like this is war, but it's not. Its just soccer," Angella put an arm on Glimmer's shoulder, "Right now, everything feels so important and like the end of the world, but when you get older you will realize that none of this matters. It's just a prank, and you don't need to get back at them."
"I'm not overreacting," Glimmer said as she moved her mother's hand away, "I am just reacting, like a normal person."
Angella was about to say something, but Glimmer beat her to the punch, " I am going to finish getting ready for the game. I wouldn't want to let the team down. Lord knows the last thing they need is for their EX-captain to be off her game"
Glimmer marched out of her Mom's office, not letting her get in another word. She walked into the girls' locker room and told everyone they had fifteen minutes to get on the field.
She roughly grabbed her soccer bag and made her way to the field before everyone else. The moment the rest of the team got there she made them gather around her. They all seemed confused because they had never seen Glimmer this pissed off before.
"Okay," Glimmer started her pregame speech, "I know that we don't have the best track record with this team, but that stops tonight. We are gonna show them that you don't mess with BrightMoon. Everyone on this team is an amazing soccer player, and they should be terrified of us. Cause we have worked and worked and worked to get the team we have now, so let's show everyone that the hard work paid off. This is the Battle of BrightMoon, and we are gonna win this fight!"
Glimmer put her hand in, and the rest of the team followed suit, " 1-2-3- BrightMoon!"
The team cheered and gave each other high fives. Glimmer smiled at the fact that she sufficiently hyped up her team, well, it wasn't really her team anymore, was it?
She was about to go over the battle strategy again when Catra came over to their side of the field. She assumed she came to smack talk her, captain vs captain, but instead, she made a B-line to Adora.
She whispered something in her ear and then left with a stupid grin on her face. Adora didn't seem to take it well though, because she snapped at her.
"I really thought we both got over this Catra,"
"Maybe you got over it," Catra said before turning around, "But you should know by now, I hold a grudge,'
Glimmer jogged over to Adora. She noticed how Adora looked at Catra walking away with a mix of longing and fire blazing in her eyes, " Hey, what did she say?"
"It doesn't matter," Adora said, "Let's just get in our positions so we can beat them,"
Glimmer nodded and sent everyone to their positions on the field. She got into place as the center-back and watched as Adora and Catra stood literally head to head in the middle of the field. Horde High had the ball at their feet first, with Lonnie looking around at her options for the starting pass.
The referee stood in the middle with his whistle in his mouth. He let the screeching tone echo through the field to show that the game was on.
And boy, was this team ready to play.