Work Text:
“I see one solution. It's—it should be—easy. Let me go. And I'll let you."
— Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone
“She sinks. She sinks in holy sadness. Like an Ophelia in tears she sinks;”
— Georges Rodenbach
Glimmer is gone. Bow is gone. Catra wasn't the first Adora lost, but she's gone, too. It was of her own volition. She didn't get a lot of choices, back in the Horde. Adora knows that, she just wishes she didn’t choose to let go, when all Adora has been trying to do was hold on.
And soon, everything will be gone, including Adora's tears. They'll sink into oblivion, along with what remains of everyone else. And it’s Adora’s fault. Because she wasn’t enough. She wonders if this is how Mara felt. Light Hope had warned her not to follow Mara's footsteps; Mara was compromised, an endangerment to She-Ra, to the planet. Did Mara regret it? Or did she seek her own end the same way Catra did?
She had seen Mara, for a split-second, a heartbeat, in this very world. Maybe before Adora vanishes, she'll be able to glitch back to Mara's time again and ask her.
Suddenly, Adora's not alone. As she blinks the salt from her eyes, she feels it. It’s almost a caress, a kiss, the fingertip on her forehead. As Adora looks up, she's met with everything she's ever wanted to see, and she can exhale without trembling. All she knows is relief: Catra is alive, she’s here.
The relief dies as soon as Adora breathes in again. This isn't Catra, or rather, she's not entirely Catra. She's a flicker of the flame Adora once knew. Catra’s once familiar, usual hello comes out crackly, distorted, broken. Catra's voice used to make her heart flutter, like one of the butterflies that lives near Razz's cottage, even recently.
But Adora supposes that every butterfly is dead now, too.
Shadow covers Catra's blue eye. It's a vortex, and what's left of her pupil is nothing but blinding light.
Stop, Adora wants to say. This isn’t you, you aren't her—
They're not in the corpse of the Whispering Woods anymore. The portal has moved them to the bar in the Crimson Waste. She's never seen Catra here, before. Catra, who is currently straddling her; the position lacks the innocence of their childhood, it lacks the suggestion as they’ve gotten older. It’s only malice and a display of power.
Adora tries to get her to stop. But Catra, or what’s left of her, doesn’t listen. She’s stronger, which means either the portal has given her new strength, or Catra’s always been holding back. Maybe she's even held her tongue this whole time, because every word that comes out of her mouth is cruel, absent of Catra's usual spite. Adora used to be able to tell the difference between her façade and her genuine anger. But she was never unrelenting, or at least, not like this.
Well, Adora’s not too sure how real it is, how real any of it is. Maybe it's a nightmare.
(Adora wants it to be a nightmare. She wants to wake up in the Fright Zone to see Catra smiling again—she wants to wake up in Bright Moon and know that Catra is okay.)
But the portal doesn't take them back to the Fright Zone, it's already gone—Adora has to remind herself. Gone like Catra, whose body is before her, whose voice used to soothe her when she had nightmares. Who would say something mean to get Adora to roll her eyes. Who would say something funny to make her laugh.
Absent of She-Ra's warmth, Adora freezes in the Northern Reach. Only this time, it's Adora on the ground, Catra above her, ready to strike. Every word comes out as venom. Catra throws her off the bridge, and Adora rises to the surface outside of Salineas. Once upon a time, Catra used to gently tug Adora's ponytail to annoy her. Now she yanks it. Then they're in the Kingdom of Snows. And the Fright Zone, somehow.
“You took everything from me,” Catra tells her.
Out of everything she’s said so far, this makes the least sense; Adora didn’t take anything from Catra. Catra gained power in the Fright Zone after she left.
They end up in Mara’s spaceship. Catra's words continue to bite. "You broke the world and it's all your fault."
When Adora pushes her, night doesn’t surround them any longer, there's nothing but purple and white and heat.
“I didn’t make you pull the switch,” Adora says, as a reminder to herself. Catra won't hear her, and Adora can't carry the blame anymore.
Adora had laughed when Bow offered her a knife back in Bright Moon. She’s not accustomed to such smaller weapons, she's prone to dropping them. But she doesn’t have claws like Catra does, and Catra is still out for blood.
“You made your choice,” Adora says. “Now live with it.”
When Light Hope had created a simulated version of Catra, she had said, "I knew you couldn’t do it,” when Adora showed her mercy, unable to finish the job.
"Oh please, you’d never have the guts,” the real Catra had told her, back in the Northern Reach, with the tip of Adora's sword kissing her throat.
But Catra miscalculated. Adora is She-Ra, and she will do what it takes.
So when Catra runs towards her, a raging, broken thing, Adora grips the knife tightly, even though her hand is sweaty and shaky. She plunges it into Catra's chest. It feels too easy, like Catra is only a cheap target from the Fright Zone, not a person.
Catra doesn’t bleed.
Adora gasps. She doesn't know if seeing blood would make her guilt better or worse.
Black light spills from the wound, it turns white, like fire. Adora shuts her eyes, pulls Catra close to her. She can't remember the last time she held Catra, or the last time they were this close, pressed against each other. Adora wills herself not to cry into her hair.
Catra doesn't moan, she doesn't even whimper. She just goes still.
And then the ground slips from beneath them.
Adora does what Light Hope once asked of her: she lets Catra go.
Catra immediately disintegrates, as if she's one with the portal. Or maybe she was always one with the portal. Adora makes herself watch anyway, makes herself remember.
*
When Angella swoops down to save her from the same fate as the girl she used to know, Adora’s set on what she has to do.
“Everyone will come home, safe and sound,” she promises Angella.
Adora has seen Catra die twice, struggling to fully process the way she turned into flames and disappeared. She doesn’t know if Catra can come back from that. She doesn’t know if she wants to return to a world without her, even after everything.
Angella won’t let her make that choice.
*
In Hordak's lab, Catra stands there, unscathed.
Adora didn’t understand the weight of her anger until now.
“I won’t let you win. I’d rather see the whole world end than let that happen,” Catra had said, the last real words she spoke to her. Catra wasn’t bluffing—Adora realizes that now. She meant it.
What’s worse, what sparks the deepest rage, is that after all of that, Adora is still relieved that Catra made it back in one piece, her chest absent of a knife wound. But Adora can only glare into her newly returned blue eye, can only wish this relief will burn away.
Adora meant what she had told Catra, corrupt or not.
She made her choice.
Now they’re both living with it.