Amongst The Stars: Chapter 8 (Patreon)

After several years, I'm working on Amongst The Stars again! Click for the link.double trouble (without double trouble)

Catra crashed through the trees, hopping over gnarled roots and through clawing branches. One limb snagged her shirt, but she tore free and kept running. Heavy boot steps crunched behind her, followed by a sudden, sharp crrrack!

Don’t look back, don’t look back…

She looked back. The other She-Ra was gaining on her, holding a tree trunk above her head. Her ominous crimson glow flared brighter as she hurled the tree at Catra, snapping several others on its way.

“Look out!” Someone grabbed Catra’s forearm, yanking her down. Catra swallowed a scream as the tree flew overhead. It landed yards away with an earth-shaking thud.

Panting, Catra looked at her savior. She found herself staring into her own mismatched yellow-blue eyes. This Catra was thinner, though. Gaunt. Exhausted. Her long mane was matted and tangled, her clothes frayed and torn. 

Sympathy tugged at Catra’s heartstrings. Normally, she wouldn’t trust herself from another dimension. She didn’t fully trust herself in her own dimension. But this other Catra had saved her life.

“What’s wrong with her? How do we stop her?”

“Later.” Other Catra dragged Catra onto her feet and into a stumbling run. 

Catra did her best to keep up until a loud shout sounded behind her. She whipped around and saw her She-Ra and the corrupted She-Ra locked in combat. They were a golden-red whirl of kicks and punches, moving so fast Catra’s eyes could barely keep up.

Corrupted She-Ra surged forward, cracking her forehead against She-Ra’s. 

She-Ra stumbled and cried out, reaching for her head.

Corrupted She-Ra locked an elbow around her neck and squeezed. Her biceps bulged, her face a twisted mask of anger.

“Adora!” Catra jerked free of Other Catra, turning around and running back toward the fight.

“Stop!”

Catra ignored her double. She made a beeline for the She-Ras and launched herself into the fray. She leaped on Corrupted She-Ra’s back, digging her claws into the uniform—

Silky white fabric, nicer than anything she’d ever owned. Even her leather armor. She likes the way it felt against her fur. She likes how the white uniform and the black-winged crest on the chest looks in the reflective metal walls of Horde Prime’s ship.

It makes her feel peaceful, somehow. Relaxed. Orderly. She knows her purpose here.

A clawed hand settles on her shoulder, heavy and reassuring. Horde Prime’s ghostly pale reflection joins hers. His thin black lips curl into an approving smile.

No. No!

Cold green slime swallows Catra’s legs, then her stomach, then her shoulders. Her silk clothes grow heavy, dragging her down as she flounders. She fights to keep her head above the surface, but more of the goo floods her mouth, cutting off her breath…

Catra thrashed and clawed at everything within reach, fighting for freedom. “Stop! I won’t go in! I won’t!” She wheezed as a solid punch landed straight in her gut, sending her sprawling onto the ground. Her stomach lurched and bile burned her throat.

After the initial wave of pain passed, Catra blinked. She saw only a blur of brown and green at the end of a black tunnel. She shuddered, then collapsed, curling into a ball on the dirt as darkness pressed in on all sides.

The darkness receded as a warm golden light washed over her. A pair of strong arms scooped her off the ground. She took a great gasping breath, then relaxed as the warm, familiar scent of Adora filled her nose. Her Adora. Even in her She-Ra form, she smelled the same.

Catra’s vision snapped back into focus. Over She-Ra’s shoulder, she glimpsed a giant version of Melog wrestling Corrupted She-Ra to the ground. Their ears were pinned back, their mane bristling as they clamped their teeth around Corrupted She-Ra’s shoulder.

With a roar, Corrupted She-Ra jerked her shoulder free of Melog’s jaws. She grabbed them by the mane and yanked their face toward hers. Pulsing red light surrounded them, and Melog began to shrink. Their smooth, muscular frame withered in a matter of moments. They whimpered, falling limp on the forest floor.

“Melog!” Catra struggled free of She-Ra’s arms, hopping onto her feet. A cold pit of fear tore open in the bottom of her stomach. She wouldn’t get there in time. Corrupted She-Ra had regained her footing, looming over Melog’s small, crumpled form.

A pink flash filled the forest as Glimmer popped into being between Melog and the corrupted She-Ra. Corrupted She-Ra snarled, her glowing red fist drawn back to strike.  A glint of light caught her hand—a pair of brass knuckles, the source of the eerie crimson glow.

Is that… her sword?

Catra ran toward Melog, knowing she wouldn’t make it, but driven by pure desperation.

An arrow zipped through the trees, quivering in the ground between Glimmer and Corrupted She-Ra. A net sprang from its shaft, hitting Corrupted She-Ra square in the stomach and wrapping down around her legs. She toppled forward and hit the ground, howling with fury.

“Come on,” Glimmer said, popping in beside Catra and She-Ra. “We don’t want to fight this fight.”

Catra shook her head. “Melog—”

Bow jumped down from a tree limb and gathered Melog into his arms. Melog had shrunk to the size of a regular housecat. They curled against Bow’s chest as he hurried to join them.

Catra took Melog. They blinked up at her with round, foggy eyes.

“I’ll heal them later,” She-Ra said, squeezing Catra’s arm. “Right now, we have to get out of here.” She glanced toward Corrupted She-Ra, writhing wildly within Bow’s net.

“I know a place,” Other Catra said, emerging from behind a nearby tree trunk. “You aren’t with Horde Prime, are you?” Her gaze darted around the group, eyes narrowed with suspicion.

“No,” She-Ra said. “We’re Horde Prime’s enemies. We defeated him in our dimension. Is yours still…?”

Corrupted She-Ra roared. One of the strands of rope around her legs snapped.

“Hurry!” Other Catra ran off into the forest. Catra and the others hurried after her, followed by the haunting sound of Corrupted She-Ra’s screams.

***

As they crashed through the forest, Catra took the lead, climbing, scrambling, and leaping to keep up with her double. The Other Catra was fast, so fast that Catra almost lost her several times. Then she’d glimpse a shifting shadow, hear the crunch of fallen leaves, or see the flick of a tail. Other Catra was making sure they kept up.

”This… is bullshit…” Glimmer panted, stumbling over a raised tree root.

Bow caught her. “Don’t talk, run!”

They broke into a small clearing. Without the canopy of the trees for shelter, freezing rain pelted down without mercy, as though the roiling black clouds that filled the sky were weeping. Through the storm, Catra saw her double enter a hut tucked into the base of an old, gnarled tree. She followed, throwing the door wide open.

Her friends tumbled in after her.

”Shut it,” Other Catra hissed.

“Excuse me?” Glimmer said, placing hands on hips.

“Shut the damn door!”

She-Ra kicked the door shut, cradling Melog’s shrunken form in her arms. Catra hurried over, stroking their flowing mane. “You okay, buddy?”

Melog blinked up at Catra with pupilless eyes, then licked her hand. She took Melog from She-Ra, who slumped forward with her hands on her knees. With a dull shimmer of gold, she became Adora again, her back heaving as she gulped for air. “Just need… a second… Gosh, that was a lot of running.”

Catra rocked Melog in her arms, observing her counterpart. This Catra didn’t look as much like her as she’d thought at first. The color of her fur and eyes were familiar, but her mane was long and matted. Her clothes were ripped and torn in several places. She had a sharp, hungry look about her. That, Catra recognized. She’d seen it in the mirror back in the Fright Zone, when she hadn’t slept, hadn’t eaten, hadn’t trusted a single soul.

Looks like the other me has gone through some serious shit too.

“Will Red She-Ra find us here?” Bow wrung his hands, his eyes darting toward the door.

“You’d better hope not, Loverboy.” Other Catra aimed her fist at Bow. A white and green gauntlet on her forearm began to glow, and a red dot appeared on the middle of his forehead. “Turn around, slowly, and show me the back of your neck.”

Bow held up his hands. Before he could speak, Glimmer poofed next to Other Catra and seized her elbow. They both shouted, and Other Catra toppled Glimmer with a leg sweep. Glimmer dragged Other Catra to the floor with her, wrestling for control of—Catra had no idea. She’d never seen anything like the gauntlet before.

Catra’s mind screamed for her to move, to help Glimmer, but her body froze. All the blood in her veins went cold and her vision narrowed to a long, dark tunnel. The booming thunder of her heartbeat roared in her ears, much louder than the storm outside.

“Stop!” Adora jumped onto the dogpile, pulling Other Catra and Glimmer apart. Bow yanked Glimmer away while Adora restrained Other Catra’s arms behind her back. “Everyone, just calm down. We don’t need to fight.”

Other Catra went limp in Adora’s hold. All the fight seemed to drain out of her. The fearful expression on her dirty, terrified face twisted into one of grief. “I hope you’re right, Adora. I really want to believe you.”

Catra inhaled sharply and shook off her numbness. She couldn’t give in to panic—not now. “We aren’t with Horde Prime,” she said, turning around to show the scar on the back of her neck. “Not anymore. In fact, we killed him and saved Etheria in our dimension. We were trying to open a portal to Despondos, but we missed our destination and ended up here.”

Other Catra gave a quiet grunt, but said nothing.

Glimmer shrugged Bow’s hand from her shoulder. “If you’d just waited and listened instead of pointing that thing at my boyfriend, we would have told you all about it.”

Other Catra flashed her fangs at Glimmer. “Before or after you attacked me? Do you really expect me to believe you’re from another dimension?”

“We don’t want to fight,” Adora said. “If I let you go, do you promise not to attack us?”

Other Catra growled, blowing her ragged bangs out of her eyes with a frustrated huff of air. “I’m not promising anything. But I saved your lives, remember? If I wanted you dead, you’d be empty husks back there in the woods.”

“Husks?” Adora asked.

Other Catra’s defiant grimace softened into the same sad look as before. “You… the other you… does that to rebels now. Sucks the life right out of them.”

Adora snatched her hands away from Other Catra. “I—what?”

Other Catra stood up, making a useless effort to straighten her ruined clothes. “My She-Ra is chipped. Has been for a while. Now she’s draining rebels as fast as she can find them.” Her ears drooped and her eyes flicked down toward the floorboards. “I’m one of the only ones left.”

Catra felt a tug at her heart. This was even worse than what she’d endured, being chipped herself. As much as she’d hated Adora in the past, Adora had never tried to kill her. She’d insisted they could be friends again in spite of it all. Adora had always held out hope they’d be reunited someday, no matter how often Catra pushed her away.

She shifted Melog’s shriveled form into the crook of one arm and approached Other Catra, resting a hand on her shoulder. Other Catra flinched, but didn’t push it away. “We stopped Horde Prime back in our world. We’ll do it again. We’ll help you get your She-Ra back.”

Other Catra looked up, staring into Catra’s eyes with burning intensity. “Did yours get chipped too? Did you save her?”

Catra’s stomach lurched, but she pressed on. “No. I did.”

Other Catra stepped back, clasping the base of her neck in her hand. Neither of them spoke again, avoiding each other’s eyes. Though their experiences were different, they both knew the horror of Horde Prime’s chips.

“It won’t be easy, but it should be pretty simple,” Bow said. “I hacked Horde Prime’s spire in our dimension, with Entrapta’s help. We can do the same thing here. Once the signal’s broken, She-Ra and anyone else with a chip will be free. Horde Prime won’t stand a chance against two She-Ras.”

Glimmer cleared her throat. “About that. New Catra, you called Bow “Loverboy” earlier. Does that mean there’s another Bow, too? Another me?” Her eyes flew wide open. “Please tell me you and him aren’t…”

Other Catra gagged. “Ew, gross! I call him that because he’s such a sap for you. Always has been.” A hint of a smile tugged at her mouth before it fell away. “Right now, he and Entrapta are working for Horde Prime. They’re chipped, too. So are you, Cupcake. You’re his top enforcer—and believe me, taking you down won’t be a walk in the park either.”

Glimmer clasped a hand to her mouth, her shoulders rising toward her ears. Catra recognized the look on her face: shame. To break the tension, Catra smirked at her. “Should I start calling you Cupcake too, Sparkles?”

“Sparkles?” Other Catra wrinkled her nose. “That’s dumb.”

”You’re dumb,” Catra said.

“Well, your face is dumb.”

“It’s your face too!”

“Stop.” Adora touched Catra’s arm, then took Melog from her embrace. “Let me check them over and make sure they aren’t hurt. Then we’ll listen to the other Catra’s story and come up with a plan.”

A shiver ran down Catra’s spine. Instead of offering comfort, Adora’s voice, flat and monotone, reminded her of a Force Captain barking out orders. But in her wide blue eyes, Catra saw the shimmer of unshed tears.

Crap. If Glimmer feels guilty hearing she’s a bad guy, Adora must be freaking out that her double is draining people’s life force. She closed her eyes. Focus. Adora isn’t giving up. You can’t, either. Damn, this being a hero business really sucks.

Adora kissed Melog’s head, and a soft golden light suffused their body. They shuddered, then stretched out, yawning luxuriously. When they opened their eyes, they seemed brighter and healthier.

Okay now. Thank.

Catra sniffed, blinking away the burn of tears. No way was she crying in front of her double. “They say they’re okay. Thanks, babe.”

Adora managed a weak smile. “Whew. I’m so happy to hear that.” She set Melog on the floor, where they grew to their normal size. They stayed by Adora’s side, pressing their head against her hip. Catra sensed they were trying to reassure her.

Other Catra cleared her throat. “Babe?” She looked between Catra and Adora. “Are you two an item or something?”

“Yeah,” Catra muttered.

At the same time, Adora said, “Catra’s my girlfriend.”

Even in such a terrible situation, the word girlfriend gave Catra a pleasant tingle in her stomach.

“Oh.” Other Catra rubbed her shoulder and looked away. “Guess alternate dimensions really can be different.” She gestured at Melog. “Who’s that?”

“Melog,” Catra said. “I found them on an abandoned planet during the war. It had magic once, before Horde Prime destroyed it. They wanted to come back to Etheria, and we stuck together after that.”

“So they can talk?”

“Kind of. I hear their thoughts in my head. They can phase between dimensions and go invisible too. So can anyone who’s touching them.”

Other Catra’s eyes went wide. “Invisible? That’s perfect! We can sneak into the spire and turn off the signal.”

“Like I said, it’ll be simple, but not easy,” Bow said. “We might have to, uh… stop our counterparts before they stop us.”

“Tough call,” Other Catra said. “Neutralize the threat and risk our lives, or go right for the heart.”

Bow gasped. “Neutralize? We can’t hurt our other selves! It isn’t their fault Horde Prime is controlling them.”

“We might not have a choice,” Glimmer said. “As long as they’re chipped, they won’t hesitate to kill us. Knowing what we’re capable of, they definitely can.”

“No,” Adora said, her voice a sharp snap that made everyone stand at attention. “No lethal force. Otherwise, we’re just as bad as Horde Prime.”

A heavy silence hung over the group. 

“Fine.” Other Catra crossed her arms, turning her back on everyone else. “But if it comes down to She-Ra or me, I’m choosing myself. I’ll die before I let that monster chip me.”

At the word monster, Adora winced.

Catra sidled up next to her and pressed a hand into the small of her back. “She means Horde Prime,” she whispered. “Not She-Ra.”

Adora gave a long sigh. “I’m not so sure anymore. What she did to Melog…”

“She won’t do it to us,” Catra said. “I won’t let her.” She’d already broken so many promises when it came to Adora. She intended to keep this one, no matter what it took.

“Who else will be at the spire?” Glimmer asked. “We need to know who our enemies are.”

“Well, Shadow Weaver’s dead,” Other Catra said, “but Micah could be a problem. That guy’s like a walking bomb, destroying everything in his way.”

Catra noticed the way Glimmer swallowed at that revelation. They made eye contact for a brief moment, but broke it right away. Neither of them said anything.

“The other princesses, minus Entrapta, rule their kingdoms in Horde Prime’s name,” Other Catra continued. “They probably won’t be at the Spire unless he calls for them. We need to hit him before he can.”

“What about Mom?” Glimmer asked. “I mean, Queen Angella.”

Other Catra frowned. “She could be on the ship, too. Not as scary as Micah, in my opinion, but don’t underestimate her. She’s crazy paranoid—was even before Horde Prime chipped her. Once he took you, she kind of lost it. That’s when the rebellion really fell apart.” Her tail drooped. “I might be all that’s left now. We scattered when Prime attacked our base in the caves under Brightmoon.”

Glimmer choked on a sob, seeking shelter under Bow’s arm. He held her to his chest, stroking her hair. “It’s okay. If we’re stealthy enough, we won’t have to fight her. We can free her and everyone else.”

“Yeah. Right.” Glimmer sniffed, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. “Free her. We can do that.”

Hesitantly, Catra approached, placing her hand on Glimmer’s shoulder. She’d never been good at the whole comforting thing, but she had to try. “We will. I promise.”