Chapter Text
6 YEARS AGO
“Catra..I’m so sorry about Ms. Weaver, but can you please get up.” Weaver had just finished another one of her punishments that left Catra shaking. Every time something like this happened all she wanted to do was lay in bed all day and cry. “Catra, you have to get up. You know it’ll only make things worse if she catches you,” But of course that’s never an option.
“Then I can suck it up and take it, I don’t want to move,” Catra’s words muffled through her pillow. If it were any other day, maybe Catra would get up and do her chores, avoid more screaming and punching; but at this particular moment, Catra felt like she couldn’t even move her arm without sobbing.
Adora frowned, she had never seen Catra like this before. She's been yelled at by Shadow Weaver many times, what made this one different? She decided to slowly make her way over to the bed, cautiously planting herself on the edge of the bottom bunk. Although Catra wasn’t looking, she could feel Adora’s weight shift the bed and she couldn’t help but smile a little at the carefulness that Adora had put into sitting on the mattress, especially since this is her bunk and not Catra’s; she likes to steal it any chance she gets because not only is Adora’s bed far more comfortable, it’s also just..nicer, somehow. “Please, don’t joke like that. I don’t want anything happening to you again.”
“Not a joke, I just want to sit here forever.” Catra shifted slightly to now face the wall, and away from Adora.
After no response came from Adora, Catra took it as a sign to continue and hopefully end this conversation. “Look, Adora, if you’re going to keep trying to make me move it’s not going to work, so either leave or join me.” Catra knew that giving Adora a forced choice would get her to leave, because let’s be honest, there’s no way Adora’s staying and risking ‘disrespecting’ Weaver. Full proof plan.
“Okay,”
See, full proof. Catra was ready to celebrate her victory as she waited for Adora to get out and leave her to melt away until she suddenly felt herself be scooped up barely above the bed like she was a fucking kitten. “Hey! Adora, what the hell are you doing?!” Catra protested, flailing her arms in the air and kicking her feet,
“Making room.” Adora placed Catra back down, this time, closer to the wall.
“Uhm, for what..?” Catra was now sitting up and looking like she was ready to stab Adora in the face.
“For me, duh.” Adora’s face could not have shown less of a reaction, she was staring at Catra like she was the idiot, which only made Catra more ready to stab her.
“You told me that I could either leave or stay with you, and I’m deciding to stay.” Adora was now scooting in next to Catra and weaving her way under the thin blanket they were provided.
Catra just stared at her and blinked. Plan backfired. “Yeah, okay, I did say that, but it was kind of my full proof plan to get you to get out.”
Adora smiled, shoving herself deeper into the covers until her head was resting on her pillow and facing up towards Catra, who was still sitting up. “Yeah, but if you’re staying here then so am I.”
“Adora, no. You’ll get in trouble with Weaver, and I know you’re too much of a goody-two-shoes to handle that.” Catra was now attempting to shake Adora up and out of bed, but that wasn’t working very well.
“Nuh-uh, I can handle it fine! So, I’m staying here, I won’t leave you.”
Catra's face softened — a few seconds ago, this was the last thing that she wanted, but somehow, Adora always found a way to change her mind. Catra sunk into the blanket she was now sharing, nestling her head into Adora's shoulder.
“Ever?”
“Ever.”
PRESENT DAY
Somehow, Adora had found herself completely frozen in the middle of the crosswalk, panting and sweating as cars stopped, honking, and yelling, she didn’t even realize where she was until she was about to be trampled by some guy on a motorcycle.
Sometimes, when Adora’s running, she doesn’t really think much about her surroundings; She just runs and thinks about whatever she needs to, but sometimes that can cause her to end up in situations where she’s about to be hit by a large bike. It’s something she needs to work on.
For some reason, even though Adora had plenty of time to move out of the way and avoid this 1200 pound machine, she didn’t. She just stood there completely frozen and staring off at everything around her. She didn’t even try to cover herself with her arms or anything, she just stared.
But, Adora got lucky. The potential vehicular assaulter decided to stop literal inches away from Adora’s face, almost making her shit her pants.
Adora, who was ready to melt into a puddle and evaporate from embarrassment, was about to apologize and continue on her journey to God knows where, when the driver removed their helmet.
“Catra?”
Adora felt like she was going to throw up. When she came back to The Fright Zone she prepared herself to run into Catra, but she imagined it to be in a bar, or a random park, somewhere she could run away and hide, but here..not the most ideal place. She couldn’t believe it, Catra still looked so similar yet so different at the same time. Her hair was still poofy as ever, but also more defined and cared for. Her freckles seemed to have stayed the same from Adora’s memory, every dot perfect. Catra was wearing makeup, not a lot, just some smudged mascara and liner, but still that’s something that Adora never thought she’d see in a million years.
As Adora was lost in her thoughts and trying to process everything running through her head, the things she needed to say and ask, apologies she needed to give, she also realized that Catra hadn’t moved. She was sitting there frozen, not even looking at Adora, just down at the road next to her.
Snapping out of her, whatever this was, Adora fumbled out something quick. “Catra, what..what are you doing here?”
Hearing this Catra seemed to gain some composure, she cleared her throat and gave Adora a look that reallyyyy made her want to call the sun and ask what the hell is taking so long to melt her down into that puddle already.
“In The Fright Zone? Well, I live here. If you may recall. “ Something in Catra’s voice felt so cold, so distance. She’s heard her use this tone of voice before, just never this harsh, and never on Adora.
“Right, right..yes, yeah, I knew that, I uh, I remember, sorry.” Fuck, of course Catra wouldn’t want to talk to Adora, Adora wouldn’t want to talk to Adora either.
Catra scoffed, rolling her eyes.
Taking a deep breath Adora decided to just spit it out, no better time..kind of.
“Look, Catra I’m so-“
A loud honk suddenly interrupted the girls reunion, and then another..and another. “FUCKING MOVE, ASSHOLES!”
Oh, they’re in the middle of a crosswalk, still.
Catra plopped her helmet back on and gave Adora a short nod and pursed her lips before sliding down her visor and driving off.
Adora watched as she rode off, watching her chance to fix things leave, and nev-HONK
Right, crosswalk. She continued her jog and tried her hardest not to replay the whole interaction in her head and think about how embarrassing it all was.
Adora's keys jingled as she practically wrestled to fit them into the door lock, she couldn't get a hang of simply putting the key in and twisting it for some reason. Everything in this new apartment was so complicated. After about 2 minutes of trying, Adora gave up. She pulled the key out and kicked her door, grunting angrily to herself and pressing her head on the surface. On any other day, maybe she would've put in some more effort, or actually tried in the first place instead of angrily bashing the keys into the door and waiting for something to happen, but after seeing Catra, she could barely even breath. It was expected to run into her at some point, The Fright Zone's a decently small town, Adora knew that. She was almost even excited to see Catra, but for some reason, when the moment really came, all she could do was stand there and stutter. Adora felt like she was going to sink into the ground and die.
Adora was about to go for round two with the door when she felt a arm on her shoulder.
"AHHH!" Adora jumped up in surprise, screaming and going into a defensive karate like pose immediately.
"Hello! I noticed you were having some trouble with the lock." Adora rested her pose, embarrassed at how dumb she must look and realizing this is probably just a harmless neighbor. "Most people do when they first move here, these locks are like a black hole interface—impossible to access unless you know the exact quantum entry point." Whipping out some weird device, the lady began to bang and clang away at Adora's latch.
"Uh, excuse me, who are you? And what are you doing?" The strange girl ignored Adora and continued her work. "Hey, stop! You better not be ruining my door, I can't afford to have to pay any extra fees and this is an apartment, I can't just do whatever to my place!" Noticing that she was being ignored, again, Adora began to try and shew the girl away, although before she could even try, the women was done.
"There, now you should be able to unlock that easily, assuming you don't use-"
"Are you out of your mind!? Why would you, uh, do whatever it is you're doing? Do you even live in this complex?" Adora began to pase thinking of all the fees she'll have to pay for damaging the door, she could not afford that right now. She could barely even afford the apartment as is!
Amidst Adora's panic, she didn't even notice when the lady grabbed the key from her pocket like a ninja and unlocked the door. "There, I told you I could fix it. And don't worry about the fees, Hordak doesn't care if we fix these rusty locks, I made a deal with him. And yes, I live down the hall," The women finished, not even making eye contact as she grinned at her completed work.
Adora slowed her movement as she realized that she had actually just been helped and not screwed over by this person. "Oh, uhm, crap. I'm sorry, rough day." Adora chuckled, getting a stare in return. "Uh, thanks, for the door," Adora stuck her hand out,"I'm Adora."
Reciprocating the hand shake, the women smiled. "Entrapta,"