WHAT: Scorpia's powers go haywire and Catra takes her to the Fright Zone, where Scorpia reconnects with her runestone and tells Catra about her family WHERE: The Fright Zone, mostly WHEN: Today! WARNINGS: Not really STATUS: Complete
For all that Vallo had to offer, there wasn’t much that Scorpia enjoyed more than getting to sit on the couch on Darla with Catra watching movies. Well, sitting on the couch with Perfuma watching movies, maybe cuddling up a little bit… that would probably beat it. But Catra was her best friend, so watching movies with Catra was pretty good too.
Which is why she couldn’t understand the feeling that came over her, very suddenly and unexpectedly, about halfway through the movie. She couldn’t explain the feeling if she tried; it was both uncomfortable and comforting, like a hug where all the pieces didn’t quite fit, with jabbing elbows and and maybe some uncomfortable shoulder spikes in the lower back, like if she could just adjust something it would all come together comfortably.
She shifted in her seat, but it didn’t help, so she shifted again, and that didn’t help. She felt a static on her skin that she couldn’t quite explain. She looked down at her arms, and saw the red electricity arcing from spot to spot, until, entirely unexpectedly, a great bolt of it discharged from her. She let out a surprised yelp.
This was nice. If someone asked her a year ago where she’d see herself today - whelp, the answer would be cynical, and nowhere near the reality of this situation. Darla was decked out to be home, she and Adora were fucking married (so cool, dude), more princesses were coming through the Vallo gates (she was still waiting for the water princess to come and drown her but Glimmer and Perfuma were nice to have), and she and Scorpia were okay.
As in, lounging on a couch, Catra’s legs sprawled on Scorpia’s lap with a funny little rom-com playing on the television. They were besties. Doing bestie things, and it felt good. Great, even.
Until she got zapped.
One of her legs was the target, and the thing is - she knew that feeling. That sharp, frazzling jolt that sizzled under her skin and fur. It kind of hit her with a funny (or not, har har) sense of deja vu, causing her to jump. Tail puffed, ears pinned back, and she a split second away from hissing at Scorpia until she stopped herself.
And blinked. “Scorpia,” she squeaked out. “What the actual fuck?”
“I don’t know!” Scorpia exclaimed. “There’s something wrong –” she yelped again, covering her head with her arms as another jolt of lightning shot from her, hitting the TV. “Sorry! Something wrong with my powers! I don’t understand what’s happening!”
Yikes. Catra pushed herself into the corner of the couch, eyes wide and legs curled in like she was about to get zapped next - again. “Okay, don’t panic and make it worse. Stay still. Uh, breathe, or something. Ask yourself what calming techniques Perfuma would have you do??”
That was the best advice she could offer until Scorpia somehow stabilized herself and Catra could check the network to see if this was Vallo doing a thing and making shit haywire for its residents, again.
Okay, that sounded like good advice. WWPD. Scorpia had been pretty calm when this started, but worrying about it definitely seemed to make things worse.
“She’d tell me to breathe,” Scorpia said, and then did that, deep in through the nose and out through the mouth. She wished Perfuma was here right now so she could give her advice, but Scorpia was pretty sure if she tried touching her phone now to get in touch with her, she’d only fry it. “And maybe she’d tell me to meditate?” she asked.
She closed her eyes and tried to do just that. Breathe in, breathe out, think of Perfuma and trust that Catra could absolutely fix this and focus on each breath. The electricity still coursed over Scorpia’s skin, arcing from point to point, but at least, for now, it stopped discharging.
“Cool. Do that,” Catra insisted, trying to remain as calm and collected as possible - more for Scorpia’s sake than hers. After slowly unspooling herself up from the couch, she snatched up her phone from the end table and began a quick browse of the network. Nothing too worrisome happening, no mentions of a Vallo fuckery that could equate to this...
Hmmm. “I don’t think this place is messing with you,” she replied after a few seconds, biting on her bottom lip as she watched Scorpia with some scrutiny. “How do you feel?”
“It feels,” Scorpia said, frowning. She hmmmmm’ed for a moment, trying to pinpoint how she felt. “It feels like when I first connected with the Black Garnet, but all wrong like something’s not –”
And then her eyes shot open, and she looked south. “I think it’s here,” Scorpia said, excited, and another bolt of lightning shot off. “The Black Garnet! It must’ve shown up!”
Catra’s reaction to a stray bolt hurtling out was a flinch, arms held up to brace herself for a split second before lowering them. It was second nature to be defensive against this kind of magic - because even if it was rightfully Scorpia’s, the memory of someone else having used it before her was an itch she wanted to claw at.
It was fine. Nothing she wasn’t used to, anyway.
“Okay, if it’s here, then…” The question was where, exactly, but she felt like they both knew the answer to that. Tail lashing apprehensively, Catra opened one of the drawers of their coffee table and pulled a Fright Zone original tablet. “We have security cameras back in the Fright Zone that are online. I can check?”
“Oh, yes,” Scorpia said, some of her excitement fading. “Yeah, I guess that’s probably a good idea.”
She hadn’t actually been to the Fright Zone since arriving in Vallo. She knew she probably should. It was her kingdom after all, and she should probably… rule it or something. Except there probably wasn’t anyone there, so it was just a big empty hunk of steel that Hordak had put up around her family’s castle, Horror Hall the only place that was relatively untouched. And the last time she’d been there she’d been trying to kill all her friends.
If the Black Garnet was there though, she didn’t think she’d be able to put it off anymore. It felt like her magic was the equivalent of a back that really, really needed cracking; she needed to reconnect with her runestone.
“Just - give me a sec,” Catra grumbled and tapped her claws on the screen, blowing out a puff of air to shoo some bangs away from her line of vision. That damn chamber was the safest bet - better than it showing up in an unpredictable forest. She started pacing, swiping through the options of security footage since there was a lot. “Black Garnet Chamber, Black Garnet Chamber…”
And - there.
The pacing stopped. Her eyes blinked widely again, and she turned the tablet around so Scorpia could get the full image. The Blacket Garnet - standing tall, sharp, but the room it was in looked different. Less intimidating and grim, now shrouded in greenery and were those magic spores floating around? Yes, those were. Those things always made Catra sneeze. “Interested in taking a ride?” she asked tentatively. “I know you haven’t - like, I get there’s complicated feelings about it. But it looks… different. We did away with the smell, and Adora’s magic restored the life around it. It’s still the Fright Zone. Just - a lot less fright?”
The Fright Zone had become The Fright Zone before Scorpia had been born, and what histories there might have been of the place were burned along with anything else. When Catra turned the tablet toward her, she extended her pincer toward it, and then pulled it back when a line of red electricity arced between her claws. She felt something then, something warm and aching that she couldn’t quite name, especially not with all the other weird feelings going on in her right now.
She nodded. “Let’s go,” she said, eyes bright. “I want to see it. And,” she yelped and winced as another electric bolt left her, this time striking a chair. “I’m sorry! I’ll replace all of this, I swear. But I think I really need to reconnect with the Black Garnet now that it’s here.”
Damn. Catra wasn’t sure how long it was going to take her to get used to that. For as long as she’d known Scorpia, harnessing magic wasn’t something she did - and she saw it firsthand when it was chipped, the raw power of using the Black Garnet with zero limitations. It had quenched (most of) Shadow Weaver’s thirst for power for most of their lives.
But Scorpia was better than her in a way that was immeasurable. Having those bolts come from her was super fucking weird, though she’d never hurt anyone with them. Not unless they deserved it.
“It’s fine, it’s just a chair,” she laughed tensely. Then she realized the television was off, and when she turned to look at it, the screen had cracked. It smelled a little fried. Oh. Shit. “Uhhh. Adora miiiight say something about the TV. We’ll cross that bridge later. Let’s go, we’ve got a skif down in the loading bay. There’s no Waypoint there and we’ve got water to cross.”
The Fright Zone was so big that Vallo had given its own little island. It was better that way. Out of sight, out of mind. She and Adora had washed their hands off it for the most part but who knows, maybe Scorpia could figure out what to do with it.
Catra led her to the elevator, dropping them down to the level they needed to be. The skiff was parked and uncovered with a few modifications added to it; a radio for music, cushions for chairs. She swiped the keys for it (it had fuzzy little dice hanging off it). “We have more of these back there,” she pointed out. “If you find yourself wanting one. I like using these and the bike. Waypoints make me sick.”
Stupid teleportation tricks.
Scorpia didn’t know if grabbing a blanket and wrapping herself up in it on her way to the elevator would help much with the electricity, but it seemed to keep it at least a little contained. Anyone who touched the blanket was liable to get a nasty shock, but at least it wasn’t discharging anymore.
“Oh, well, I never learned to actually drive a skiff,” Scorpia admitted, a little sheepishly. Or rather, she’d tried once and the instructor had promptly decided Never again.
“Didn’t know that,” Catra blinked, finding herself oddly surprised about that. It wasn’t as if she was completely negligent of Scorpia during their time in the Fright Zone. Sure, yeah, she was obsessed with her tasks and was undeniably focused on whatever mission she was spearheading - but come to think of it, they always had other people take the reins of navigating.
She never thought much of it.
The skiff started up, and the ramp opened to allow them a clean exit. “Now’s probably not the best time with you being, you know, electrically charged and all,” she began. “But I can teach you if you want? Don’t listen to Adora when it comes to my driving - I crashed it, once, and she barely got a scratch, so.”
“Oh, it’s not a big deal. It never really came up.” Well, maybe sometimes, but Catra had always been focused on something more important, so Scorpia couldn’t blame Catra for not remembering. She smiled, a soft, gentle thing, and cozied up in her blanket a little more. “I’d like that a lot. I always thought that flying around on a skiff, going wherever I wanted, seeing all the sights I wanted to see, would be a lot of fun. And even if you do crash a lot, I mean, I’m pretty tough so I think I could handle it.”
Catra knew Scorpia enough to where not to really believe the whole ‘it’s not a big deal’ comment - it was something she began to notice a lot more, with how she minimized things. She didn’t say anything though. The skiff navigated over the expanse of forest and soon they were zipping across the surrounding ocean, around the other islands that surrounded the mainland.
“No crashing,” she insisted with a raspy little chortle, tail grazing Scorpia’s blanketed form. “We can work something out. It could be… fun.”
More quality time for them or - something. Whatever. Spending time with Scorpia was fun. Despite everything they’ve been through they were close. It was a good feeling.
And seeing the Fright Zone come up over the horizon was a different one. Vallo gave that monstrosity its own island for the heap of metal and junk it was, and when it arrived it had oozed fumes and smog. It took weeks for the smell to dissipate. Now it was flush with greenery, almost unrecognizable at first glance thanks to She-Ra’s magic having been unleashed on it.
“Theeeere it is,” she whistled. “Home sweet home - except not.”
Scorpia had never thought about what The Fright Zone would have been like before The Horde took over. To her, there had always just been The Horde. And besides, the place was called the Fright Zone. Their castle was Horror Hall. It wasn’t hard to believe that what she’d known her whole life was exactly how it was always supposed to be.
She didn’t recognize it when they approached; not consciously, at least. There was no way she could have placed the lush, thriving island as the desolate, polluted wasteland it had once been. But something in her heart stirred at the sight. Something that seemed to say yes, this is right.
Was she crying? Yes, she realized belatedly. She was. She rubbed at her eyes with her pincers. “I’m sorry. I don’t know why I’m… I think I must have something in my eye or… I’ll stop in a minute, I promise.”
Though, it took nearly until they were close enough to land before she managed to stop.
Catra only panicked a little bit on the inside in regards to the crying. Comforting Adora - sure, she was a professional, they’d been doing that since they were kids. But she wasn’t always the best around other friends, always worried she’d say the wrong thing or do something unwanted.
So she simmered in it once they found a semi-clear spot to land. It was still covered in greenery; some shrubs with flowers blooming, the kind she thought Perfuma could grow with her powers. After killing the engine with a twist of the keys in the ignition, Catra took a deep breath and turned to Scorpia.
“Hey,” she started, eyes darting from side to side - ears a little low. This was a more uncertain side of Catra, a tiny smidge timid. “Do you need a hug? Because I don’t mind. Hugging you, I mean. I just don’t know if those are good tears or bad tears but regardless it just looks like you could use a hug.”
That only served to make Scorpia cry even harder.
Catra! Catra asking for a hug!
Scorpia never thought she’d see the day.
She nodded, sobbed, and then pulled Catra into a hug: firm, but not quite bone crushing.
“I just thought… I always… Who knew the Fright Zone could be so beautiful.”
Instinct tensed her muscles for a whole two seconds before Catra relaxed, and she did return the hug with the same kind of tightness. Scorpia deserved that, and her arms were warm and comforting. Now that the dust had settled between them and they were on the same page (plus she wasn’t actively struggling to escape her), she could appreciate it.
“And not smell like a hot pile of burning ass?” she retorted and gave her a pat-pat on the back. Scorpia had been crying and she was, uh, trying to be the emotionally supportive friend here. “It does look great though, huh? I haven’t been here since Adora did all of… this.”
Transformed it into something better. They had gathered their old cadet files, burned Shadow Weaver’s spare robes she’d kept in her office - you know, free therapy. After that they didn’t really see the point in coming back.
Scorpia soaked in the totally willing and requested hug from Catra another moment, and then, reluctantly, let her go before she could accidentally shock her again. “It does look great,” Scorpia said, taking it all in. “Do you think it could look like this again back home, too?” she asked, and then, as a jolt of electricity sparked off her shoulder, added, “We should probably go find the Runestone, huh?”
Shit, yeah. Catra kind of forgot about Scorpia going magically haywire there. “It probably already does,” she admitted. “She-Ra’s magic healed Etheria, right - so that means she probably restored the Fright Zone’s natural surrounding ecosystem too?” Gods, she’s probably been around Entrapta too much. “Same thing with here.”
There were some floating spores that came their way. One tickled her nose and caused her to let out a squeaky sneeze (wherever Bow was in the universe, he probably went awwww) and that made her decide she was very eager to get inside. Catra tapped her claws on an access pad, and a set of doors slid open for them for access. It was the docking bay. “I still remember every twist and turn of this place like the back of my hand,” Catra sighed out. “You?”
“I don’t think I could ever forget,” Scorpia said. “I mean, we lived here our entire lives. It would have to be something pretty big to make us forget, I bet. Like amnesia? I keep seeing amnesia come up on TV.” She frowned, a little uncertainly. “Do you think one of us will ever get it? It seems pretty common. I don’t even know what I’d do if I forgot you and Perfuma and everyone. You’ll hit me in the head again so I’ll remember if I ever get amnesia, right?” That, at least, was how it always seemed to happen in the shows.
She placed her pincer on the scanner for the Black Garnet room. “I promise to do the same if it’s you!”
Catra’s brows rose high, hidden by the sweep of her bangs. “Amnesia - no, Scorpia, we won’t get it,” she chuckled (a compromise from the laugh she wanted to let out). “I mean, unless we suffer some major brain injury or like, I don’t know, Vallo does a thing but I promise you it’s not something that regularly happens. I just - kind of wish time would make it kind of fade?”
The Fright Zone didn’t serve a purpose anymore besides being this monument that held a mixed bag of memories. This room was the worst of it. It took a few seconds for the doors to open - there were some vines caught in the tracks thanks to all this greenery that was insistent on invading the halls - and then there it was.
Standing tall, glowing menacingly. The Black Garnet. Catra let out a low whistle.
“Oh, good,” Scorpia sighed, relief obvious in her voice. “You know, it happens all the time on television, and I was starting to think that it was really common. I mean, I’d never heard of it happening in Etheria, but who really knows! Maybe they just never talked about it! I’m glad that’s not something we actually need to–”
Scorpia stopped as they stepped into the chamber. The Black Garnet was standing there, dark and foreboding, pulsating with energy, and Scorpia swallowed. She’d done this before, with Glimmer. There was no reason to think that the Black Garnet would reject her here, not when it had already accepted her back home. But what if it did?!
She took a deep breath. “I can do this,” she said to herself, and then she stepped toward it and placed her pincers on it. She felt the shift immediately, like something sliding into place. She glowed red, the electricity pulsing around her, and then she felt herself lifting from the ground, before releasing a sudden discharge of energy and floating back down to earth.
“I think that’s that,” Scorpia said, feeling stronger than she had in a while – she’d still had her electricity powers when she’d arrived, but not like this.
Catra swallowed this barbed lump in her throat.
Some of her worst memories had been in this room, in the presence of that rock - crackling and sparking, basking in this ominous glow that reminded her of blood. Her association with it had always been bad, evil, like it never came from anything kind and Scorpia shouldn’t be bonding with it. But that was an internal knee-jerk reaction she consciously reeled back, kept locked away in this vault of uncertainties towards magic she still hadn’t completely done away with.
This was Scorpia’s birthright. And if there was anyone who would wield its powers in an uncruel way, it would be her. (Besides, what happened and how she handled it under Horde Prime’s thrall didn’t count, even if that experience was kind of terrifying).
The discharge had her hissing in alarm, tail fluffed up and claws extended as if she was a split second away from pouncing the Black Garnet for seizing Scorpia the way it did, but - turns out, that’s what was supposed to happen. Scorpia definitely wasn’t harmed.
“So you’re -” Catra squinted and smoothed her tail out. “You’re okay, right? There’s - there’s nothing else you have to do? You can just… leave this here and be at full power, or whatever?”
“Oh yeah, we should definitely leave this here,” Scorpia agreed. She didn’t know if it could be moved. She didn’t really know anything about the Runestone – the only thing she’d known about it, all her life, was that Shadow Weaver had told her that the stone had rejected her, that she couldn’t connect to it – but something in her gut told her that it belonged in the Fright Zone, that it was part of the land here. “I don’t need to recharge or anything. At least, I don’t think so. But it won’t take too long to come back if I do.”
It didn’t look so menacing now, either, now that it was properly connected to its princess. It still glowed, but the red was warm now, instead of foreboding, nestled in with the greenery that Adora had brought here.
Scorpia wondered, a little what the rest of the place looked like. Especially… “Have you ever been to Horror Hall?” Scorpia asked.
Catra a lot less visibly bristled now, tail fur flattened out and not so stiff as if she was in the presence of a threat. The Black Garnet did look different now. Better, now that it was connected to its rightful owner.
(Magical rocks were fucking weird.)
“Uh,” she started, thinking back. Catra used to pride herself in knowing every crook and cranny of this place, no corner left unexplored (especially in her kitten years, when she was tiny enough to crawl through the vents). She knew where that hall was, but come to think of it she’s never seen it. “No. I haven’t. We used to hear ghost stories about it sometimes, when we were little. Nothing like the evil princess or Beast Island ones but it was talked about every now and then. There’s - nothing really in there, right?”
Not that the Fright Zone was particularly lacking in storage space. There were a few empty spots that held dead air. Horror Hall was one of them.
“Oh no, there’s nothing like ghosts there,” Scorpia laughed. She was about to deny that there was nothing there though, and then she thought about it. What was there? Murals of her family, some of the vandalized with the Horde symbol, a broken throne… “Nothing really there at all, I guess,” she added, a little subdued. “Did you want to see it? We don’t have to, if you’d rather go home. I know you’re probably eager to go home.” She hadn’t noticed that Catra seemed more on edge than nearly any other time Scorpia had seen her here, save for when Catra had come to apologize to her. Even that had been a different kind of edginess though; this wasn’t guilt but fear. She could come back on her own to come see it, if she decided she wanted to.
“Show me,” was Catra’s immediate response, not thinking twice about it. Having been in the presence of the Black Garnet brought a mild discomfort she could shoo away without an issue. Her ears perked forward, and she closed some distance between them for a playful shove. “This place is yours, Scorpia. That history - it’s gotta be important, yeah? So tell me about it.”
Scorpia had a family - an entire kingdom - before the Horde descended upon it and took over. Back then she hadn’t asked too many questions, thinking that if she knew as little as possible then they would just stay as ‘work associates’ or whatever. But they were actual friends now and she wanted to know.
Scorpia lit up. There’d always been a part of her that had wanted to invite Catra to Horror Hall, but she’d always held back, some part of her afraid that Catra would have rejected the offer. Scorpia’d always been used to being rejected, but this… this wasn’t something she’d wanted to be rejected about.
“I don’t know much about the history,” Scorpia confessed, leading the way back outside. She wondered if she’d get used to seeing the Fright Zone so covered in vegetation and life, instead of the cold, steel place it had been before. “I mean, I know what we were taught in Force Captain Orientation, of course, but nothing outside of that.”
Horror Hall wasn’t too far of a walk; the large, domed doorway without anything like a door. The elements had gotten to Horror Hall long before it had appeared in Vallo, and no one aside from Scorpia had cared enough for it to maintain it. Some of the portraits of Scorpia’s family had been graffitied, the Horde symbol painted over them, others were badly cracked and broken.
But in the middle of the room stood four large murals behind the shattered stone throne, each depicting a different member of the royal family.
“That’s my granddad, the king,” Scorpia said, pointing to the bearded figure, the largest and centermost of the murals. “And on either side of him, those are my moms! Granddad’s the one who made the alliance with Hordak though! The one who decided all Scorpions would be loyal to the Horde, and gave up the Runestone, and…”
And… her. The Horde had always told her that he’d given up the kingdom, that he’d wanted her to be a soldier, knowing that was what she would like most in life. Her mothers, too, had left to fight the rebels as well, shortly after Scorpia was born – long before she had any real memories of them – but they’d done it out of loyalty to the Horde. At least, that’s what Scorpia had always been told.
She fell silent, looking up at them, wondering.
Families are weird.
Not that Catra knew anything about her own. Chances are they’d been killed and she was left behind, or they surrendered her or - something, she didn’t really dare try to think about it much. All the obsessing in the world wouldn’t change anything for her.
But sometimes, sometimes, she wished there’d been something left behind of theirs. Tangible and solid to hold, like an heirloom to assign sentimental value to. It was usually a fleeting thought. Adora being a long lost twin and being reunited with her brother stirred it up a little extra lately, but meh. The found family she’d made for herself was all she needed.
(Besides, she had sold herself to the thought that her parents didn’t want her either. It seemed like an easier pill to swallow than the alternatives. Probably because that kind of thought process always had a habit of ensnaring her, anyway)
This was all Scorpia had of her own blood, though. It was a lot, though so much of it lay in ruin. Catra wondered if any of it could be restored. “And no one came to your aide,” she mumbled aloud, brushing a thick layer of dust and grime from one of the murals. Granted, yeah, the Horde was terrible and won the award of doing The Worst Things but the inaction of the other kingdoms definitely needed to be noted. It took Adora and her rousing attempts at heroism and doing The Right Thing to make them get their shit together.
No grudges, though. No more.
“I remember seeing the picture of your moms,” Catra said, looking over to her. “The, uh - framed one?” Yes, she did pay attention. She just showed disinterest most of the time. “They looked happy to have you. I’m sorry you lost them to this.”
“Oh! Their photo showed up in my room a little while ago!” Scorpia exclaimed, happily. “And Scorpy!” Scorpy, the stuffed Scorpion that had been with her since her moms were still alive.
She was subdued again, though, when she looked back at their massive portraits, towering over her and Catra. “Do you think…” She stopped, swallowed, and started again. “Do you think it’s true? That they just surrendered to Hordak without a fight, and pledged their loyalty and everything to him because they believed in what he was doing?”
She used to believe that. It was what she was told, so why wouldn’t she? Except she knew the Princesses weren’t horrible, cruel monsters, and Hordak wasn’t, you know, a great leader, and she wondered now if the rest of what she’d been told was true too. Had her family really thought Hordak was right? If they had, why was she the only one left? They couldn't all have been killed by the Princess Alliance, could they?
Catra’s jaw dropped a little. That… was a loaded question, and one she didn’t have facts about. The known story was that they surrendered and pledged their allegiance, but she also knew better than to lap up what the Horde liked to spread around as if it were the absolute truth. So this was more or less a matter of opinion.
She needed a moment to consider it.
“I think,” she started, brows pinched together as she volleyed her eyes back to the murals. “I think that they thought surrendering was maybe their best chance. Not for them, but - for you.” Catra crossed her arms. Her shoulders lifted into a small shrug. “They risked a lot by siding with Hordak. They risked more fighting with him.”
Scorpia didn’t think anyone had the facts about it. Not anyone that she knew, at least, whether they were in the Horde or in the Allianiance. Hordak, maybe. Now that he and Entrapta were together, he might even be willing to tell her, too, though it was hard to say. Maybe if both he and Entrapta were here, Entrapta could ask for her.
But surrendering so that Scorpia could have a chance… Maybe. Scorpia had always enjoyed her time in the Horde. Or, at least, she thought she had, right up until she’d joined the Princess Alliance and had seen how things were there. Maybe it really had been for the best, surrendering, giving her up to be a soldier. Sure, she hadn’t really ever had any real friends, and ration bars weren’t great, and it had really just been endless criticisms her entire life without any praise or anything else. But she’d been fed, and had been treated mostly okay, and they’d taught her things, and she’d been mostly happy, more or less. It was definitely better than not surviving. She and Catra and Entrapta had had some good times, and she was sure there’d been good times before them too.
She didn’t know how she felt about the idea of them giving into the Horde without putting up any fight though. Didn’t know how to give words to the weight in the pit of her stomach that had started to form when she’d decided to leave the Horde and had only kept getting heavier the more she saw of life outside of the Horde. She didn’t know why she felt uneasy about the idea that everything the Horde told her was true, or how she would feel if she found out it was all a lie.
She couldn’t give any of it a voice, didn’t even know where to begin on doing so, so she took a deep breath in through her nose, letting the breath stuff all of that back down into the pits of her stomach, and smiled.
“You’re probably right,” Scorpia said cheerily. “So yeah, that’s my family. Granddad, and my mom, and my mom! I’m glad I could finally bring you to see them. I wanted to before, you know, but the timing never really seemed right. You’re the first person I’ve brought here. Besides Emily, I mean.”
When she’d brought Emily here, Emily had finally managed to convince her that Catra wasn’t, you know, a great friend, and maybe the Horde didn’t have her best interests at heart. She was glad that things with Catra, at least, had changed.
Catra’s theory was rooted in an unusual sense of optimism. But she also thought of what actual mothers would do for their kids - how Angella sacrificed herself for Glimmer’s future (which would have been unnecessary if she hadn’t flipped the switch), how she saw Finn for the first time and without a doubt knew she’d do anything and everything to ensure their safety and give them their best shot.
She knew nothing of Scorpia’s mothers. Secondhand information only, and the framed picture of them holding her as a baby. They looked like parents who’d do whatever they could to make sure Scorpia survived the Horde’s invasion even if it meant she’d become another cog in their machine.
It turned out for the best though - didn’t it?
“Oh,” she said, blinking at the admission of being, like - one of the first to be here. Or to be shown this by Scorpia, to have what she knew of her kingdom and its royals explained to her. It gave her a fuzzy feeling. Like Scorpia actually did put a lot of trust in her with this despite their rocky history. “Well, thanks for bringing me here. Gives me the whole ‘I’m special’ feeling for once, it’s pretty neat.”
There was even a smirk, and no fumbling around words that were friendly or expressed some kind of genuine affection. Catra was doing better with that; being less awkward when she was doing her best to be genuinely nice. “Do you ever wanna get this place cleaned up? You can - I don’t know, reclaim parts of your kingdom bit by bit. This would be a good start.”
“You are pretty special,” Scorpia agreed, beaming at Catra. “And you’re, you know, my best friend, and I thought this is the sort of thing best friends shared with one another.”
She started a little at the idea of fixing the place up, and looked around. She didn’t know what this place had once looked like, though she imagined it was probably better than this – storage for whatever trash the Horde didn’t need, cracked and broken murals, the clear marks of graffiti and vandalism. “Do you think we could?” Scorpia asked. And then, “Do you think anyone would want to help?”
She knew she couldn’t do it herself; it was one of the reasons why she’d never thought of trying. But she knew that no one else really had great associations with the Fright Zone, and that even with all the work Adora and Catra had done fixing the place that it was still, well, kind of creepy to someone who wasn’t used to it.
She thought about what it would feel like to ask her friends fi they wanted to help her, and then have everyone turn her down. It would probably be better to just not ask in that case.
“They absolutely fucking would,” snapped Catra, but not in a mean way? It was mostly certainty, and maybe some underlying hidden threat lingering there for those who might even dare reject helping out. That wasn’t possible though. Their friends were good guys with gooey feelings that somehow weaponized the power of love and friendship to defeat their enemies (seriously, what the hell), of course they’d help. “And you know I’m in anyway. I don’t mind trying to scrub the graffiti off the walls, and Adora would help with the heavy lifting. Perfuma would probably try to liven the place up with more plants. Glimmer might throw glitter around and screech like a banshee as if she’s helping but it’s the thought that counts there.”
It wasn’t the kind of project that’d be completed overnight but it was doable. It would give the Fright Zone more meaning than being this forgotten, abandoned kingdom that’d been used as a war base all their lives.
Scorpia couldn’t help but smile at the mental image Catra had painted of their friends flitting around the place, making it presentable. It was nice, and despite whatever insecurities wanted to rear their ugly heads, Scorpia knew that Catra was right. Everyone would probably be willing to help, and having them all together would probably make the work fun.
It was still far too new, the idea of having friends who would unquestionably help with something like this.
“You’re right,” Scorpia said. “I’ll ask them. Thanks, Catra,” Scorpia said, and moved to wrap Catra in a gentle hug.
Cool, a second hug. This was fine. That wasn’t even sarcasm - it was fine. They had intended to spend the day lazing and watching some trash, hanging out like any other day so they definitely didn’t expect an emotionally packed evening like this. Scorpia’s first time back at the Fright Zone to connect to her runestone, then talking about her family.
Scorpia definitely could use that second hug. It was returned - with the vibrations of the quietest little purr. Let’s not talk about that.
“We should head back so I can buy you the biggest milkshake,” Catra grinned. “I need you to save up money anyway. You’re going to owe us a TV.”