The Start
“Hey! Come back! Thief!” A man wearing an apron shouts after the wily magicat that’s just stolen a loaf of bread from his food stand, “Get back here! Thief!”
The magicat turns back, the load of bread safely tucked inside their jacket as she waves apologetically to the man, the baker, in thanks for her breakfast, lunch and dinner for the next day or so, “Sorry!”
She sprints off in between the crowds, carefully avoiding any authority figures as she makes her escape, eventually scaling up and over a stone wall and dropping down into the outside of the markets, disappearing into the trees.
“Did you get it? Did you get it?” Excited voices shout out as soon as the magicat appears from the trees and into the small camp hidden within, “Catra! She’s back!”
The magicat, Catra, grins as she walks towards the group, “Miss me?”
A few of the kids hug her legs, effectively making her stop in her tracks as they cling to her, “Did you get it?”
“Cool it, kids.” Catra says trying to shake them off and then pulls out the loaf of bread hidden in her jacket, “Here. Tonight we eat!”
The kids all cheer, one of them grabbing the loaf and running towards the rest of the group, waving it in the air like a trophy and shouting out elatedly, “Catra did it! We have food!”
An older woman comes out to greet the magicat, she’s got blue hair and green eyes, a little older and very much the mother of the group, though she’s barely older than Catra herself, the magicat grins as the older woman wraps her up in a hug and sighs, “Thank the stars you’re back, Catra.”
“You worried about me, Delia?” Catra chuckles, “I wasn’t even gone that long.”
“You always worry me, Cat.” Delia sighs again.
“You know, we could always hunt and gather around these woods…” Catra says as she pulls back from the hug to get a good look at Delia before she frowns, narrowing her eyes at the Delia’s injured eye, “What happened?”
Delia hisses out when Catra touches her blackened eye, “It was nothing. Don’t worry about it.”
“This isn’t nothing.” Catra tilts her head and repeats, “What happened?”
Delia shakes her head, and as she’s about to answer, a young man interrupts, “Catra. Good to see you’re back.”
Catra eyes him, “You’re limping, Fagen.”
“I am.” He replies, “I’m fine. You don’t need to worry about us.”
This time Catra shakes her head, “What happened? I was only gone 2 days…”
“We were ambushed.” Fagen replies looking sheepish, “Took our weapons and all our supplies.”
“Who did this?” Catra asks angrily.
“You know who.” Fagen replies, “Said they’d be back if we didn’t clear out by the end of the week.”
“What do they want?” Catra asks trying to keep her anger in check.
Fagen looks at Delia, the latter shakes her head, “Look, we can go somewhere else. It’ll be easy enough to pick up and leave…”
The magicat shakes her head, “No. Our camp has grown threefold. There’s no way we’ll be able to get everyone up and out of these woods by the end of the week. Especially if there’s nowhere to go.”
“We aren’t giving you up, Cat.” Delia declares, “They can get someone else to do their dirty thieving jobs for them.”
“Besides, there’s nothing to stop them from taking you and then offing us.” Fagen argues, “It’s not worth it. We’ll just leave. All of us.”
“Catra, please.” Delia squeezes Catra’s elbow, “Just… help us get everyone ready to go.”
Reluctantly, the magicat nods, “Okay. Fine.”
“Great.” Fagen smiles, throwing an arm around Catra and Delia, “Come on, let’s eat before all those kiddies eat all the bread.”
Catra awakes to the sound of screaming, her claws unsheathe as she jumps to her feet and rushes out of her tent to find most of her camp on fire, a scattering of people running around trying to put the fires out as the magicat shakes her herself awake.
She looks over and sees Fagen trying to run, hampered by his injury, “Fagen! What’s going on?!”
“We’re under attack!” He shouts back, “We need to get to Delia!”
Catra stops Fagen, “I’ll get her. You make sure the rest of our people are safe. Go. Now!”
Fagen nods and rushes over to gather up the other people while Catra runs towards Delia’s tent, the fires spreading faster, smoke growing darker and heavier the closer she gets to the tent. The magicat shields her face with her arm, trying to keep under the smoke as she slashes open the side of Delia’s tent only to find the woman still in her bed, not moving.
“Delia!” Catra slides over to the other woman, collecting her into her arms and running back through the gap she’s made, “Fuck… don’t you dare die on me!”
The magicat coughs, trying to keep the smoke out of her lungs as she sprints as fast as her legs will let her towards the clearing. Delia jostles around in her arms while Catra spots her group, running towards them in a much slower pace as her lungs scream for air until…
“Oof!” Catra goes down to the ground, Delia rolls out from her grasps as the magicat finds her feet again, her head bleeding from a cut she doesn’t know where it came from as she looks around frantically trying to find the attacker, “What…? Oof!”
“Stay down.” A hoarse voice calls out.
Catra turns over onto her back and glares up at the voice, “Of course it’d be you, Rex.”
“Shut up.” Rex, a dark green lizard hybrid growls out.
“Delia! Catra!” Fagen shouts out upon seeing Rex loom over the pair, he limps towards them, a makeshift spear in his hand as he gets closer, “Get away from them!”
Rex straightens up and draws his sword, a sneer on his lips as Fagen gets closer, “Come at me.”
“Fagen, no!” Catra grunts out as she gets up, just in time to push Fagen to the side, pain radiating from her side, “Oof… Fuck…”
Rex steps forward, digging his heel into Catra’s shoulder as he slowly pulls the blade out of her side, “I don’t know why you bother, thief.”
Catra groans out in pain as she tries to get up again, only to be kicked in the face, black spots begin to appear in her eyes, feeling heavier as she tries to reach out to Delia, “No… stop…”
Her ears twitch back upon hearing the sound of a scream.
Fagen.
Catra tries to push herself up, but everything in her body screams out in pain, her body feeling heavier as she only manages to turn her head to see Rex running Fagen through with his sword. An evil laugh on his lips as he drops Fagen to the ground, the man gasping for air as he stares back at the magicat, unable to speak while Catra watches the life drain from his eyes.
Rex stomps over, steps over Catra and towards Delia, “Leave. Her. Alone.” The magicat manages to grunt out weakly.
“No.” Rex simply replies as he bends down to check on her before he huffs out a laugh, “She’s already dead. Too fucking easy.”
Catra grits her teeth, “Liar…”
Rex doesn’t even bother to reply, instead using his boot to roll her over, Delia’s body flopping lifelessly onto her back, her eyes are shut and her face blackened by the smoke as Rex kicks her once more to be sure. Looking back at Catra, he smirks, “Me? I’m not a liar.” He steps back towards Catra and crouches down, “Well, looks like your little thieving hands belong to me now.”
With one last ditch effort, Catra launches herself up and clamps her sharp teeth down on his throat as he violently thrashes around, trying to get her off, but it’s to no avail as the magicat bites down just a little harder and crushes down on his carotid artery until it splits, and he goes tumbling down.
“Fuck you.” Catra grunts out as she rips his throat out, spitting out the flesh to the ground as she falls back down again, crawling over to Delia, “Dee… Dee… wake up…”
Delia stays unmoved.
“Dee… please…” Catra pleads as she manages to put her hand on top of Delia’s, “Dee… wake up.”
“There she is!” Someone shouts, and it’s not a voice Catra recognises, “Get her! Don’t let her get away!”
“Oh fuck…” Catra curses, interlacing her fingers with Delia’s, “Wake up, Dee… please…”
Just as Catra gets picked up by a new force, a new attacker, she feels a gentle squeeze of her hand, the magicat grunts out as she’s pulled away harshly, her fingers ripped away from her friend’s as one of the soldier’s slugs her once in the gut, just below her stab wound, “You fucking killed our captain.”
“Makes us even.” Catra heaves out, “He killed Fagen and… oof! Fuck!”
The soldier strikes her once more in the gut, “On your feet, thief.”
“Fuck you.” Catra spits back as she’s once again punched in the stomach again, “Argh… fuck…”
“Keep that up and we’ll just report you missing to the boss.” The soldier threatens before he’s hit in the back of the head, “Ow! What the fuck, Will?!”
“She needs to be brought back to the ship, alive!” Will shoves the other soldier harshly, “Or did you forget that part where if she’s dead or missing, it’s going to be us getting killed, a thousand time worse than what’s going to happen to this thief.”
“Fine.” The soldier grunts out as he turns to look at Catra and glares at her, “Goodnight, thief.”
“Wha…?!” Catra manages to say before the soldier knocks her out with a metal baton, her body doesn’t even hit the ground when she’s dragged off with the soldiers.
“Adora! Wait up!” Bow shouts out as he runs after the blonde, panting after her, “What’s the rush?”
“I’m just excited!” Adora gushes as she runs just a little faster, “The tournament is next week. I can’t wait!”
Bow smiles as he manages to find a comfortable rhythm next to Adora, “Hey, have you packed yet?”
“Oh, shit.” Adora stops suddenly, “When’s our train?”
“In a few hours.” Bow hunches over with his hands on his knees, “We’ve got a car coming to pick us up to get to the train station in an hour.”
Adora turns around, “I’ve gotta go! I’ll see you out front! Bye!”
Bow watches, shaking his head with a smile as Adora sprints off back home to pack.
“Get up, thief!” Someone kicks Catra in her injured and still bleeding side, jostling her awake painfully, “Get the fuck up!”
Catra groans out in pain as some grabs her by the messy mane of long hair, lifting her up to her feet as she growls out in pain, “Fuck…”
“I have an idea, boss.” One of the soldier’s say and pulls out his sword and slices through Catra’s main, dropping the magicat down to the ground once more, the soldiers laugh as they circle the injured magicat, “It looks a little uneven… maybe I need to cut more off.”
Catra’s held in place as her hair is hacked off with the sword, barely missing her ears as she slowly gains consciousness through all the pain, “I’m going to kill all of you.”
The guards, all seven of them standing around her laugh as punches reign down on her once more, she passes out once again.
“We’re finally here!” Glimmer announces once the she exits the train, quickly turning back, “Oh, Bow! Grab our bags please!”
“On it!” Bow enthusiastically calls back as he grabs his and Glimmer’s bags, Adora pulling on her backpack and grabbing her suitcase, “Hey, ‘Dor, can you grab this?”
“Sure.” Adora takes the laptop bag from him and lets him depart first, “Right behind you, Bow.”
He nods, smiling forward, “I’m so excited to be here!”
“Me too!” Adora grins widely as they join Glimmer on the platform, the blonde passing the laptop bag to the other women, “Okay. Where are we going?”
“This way!” Glimmer points to the exit and the trio start walking out of the station and towards the taxi rank.
“Hey! Hey! Boss! Car’s a coming!” A soldier shouts out, pointing to the taxi that’s oncoming, “I’m not carrying this piece of shit on the back of my horse all the way to the ship.”
“You’re not even fucking carrying her.” Will points out, “Your horse is.”
“Whatever. She keeps threatening to fall off and break her fucking neck.” The soldier scoffs, “Besides, it’ll be quicker in a car than on horse.”
Will gets an idea, “You’re right, soldier.”
The solider looks around smirking at the others.
“You, Travers and Klay will take our horses to the ship. Me and the rest will go with the thief in the car.” Will says, raising his eyebrow in challenge as he watches the soldier’s jaw drop, “Good. Now, you three. Go get that taxi.”
“Hey, there’s someone on the side of the road.” Glimmer points out.
“Bandits.” The taxi driver simply says, “We don’t stop. It’s dangerous to stop on this road.”
“Oh.” Glimmer says surprised, “Really?”
“Yes.” The taxi driver replies with a nod.
“Oh, okay.” Glimmer sits back down in the front seat as she eyes the person trying to wave them down, “But… what if they need help?”
“They don’t. Trust me.” The taxi driver glances over at Glimmer for a moment before going back to the road.
As they get closer, the person on the side of the road seems to sense that the car isn’t going to stop and they wave back towards the tree line, dragging out someone or something towards the road.
“Oh, my stars… is that a person?!” Bow’s eyes widen.
“Bandits.” The taxi driver repeats, “Ignore them.”
The trio watch as they get closer to the group on the side of the road. The taxi driver’s breathing speeding up slightly as he grips the steering wheel just a little tighter and then…
CRASH!
The taxi driver swerves, spinning the car around 180 before coming to a stop. The windscreen is smashed in, blood, flesh and hair smothered across it as the object says on top of the bonnet.
“Is everyone alright?!” Adora shouts out to the occupants of the car, unbuckling her seatbelt and checking on Bow next to her in the backseat.
“I’m okay!” Glimmer calls back before she reaches over to check on their driver, “Oh… I think our driver needs help.”
Adora opens the door, helping Bow and Glimmer out first before heading to the driver’s door, “Hey! Hey! Are you okay?!”
Pulling open the driver’s door, the driver slumps out sideways, blood all over his face as he’s held in place by his seatbelt, the blonde checks him over and breathes out in relief. Bow comes around and unbuckles him, they pair pull him out to the side of the road, “He’s still breathing.”
Adora rolls him off to the side, “Call an ambulance!”
“On it!” Glimmer shouts back as she goes to pull out her phone before, “Hey! What the…ow?!”
“Glim?” Bow quickly gets up and sees a group of 7 people walking towards them, some on horses but all brandishing weapons, his eyes widen, “Adora? We’ve got trouble!”
Adora looks up and sees the group, “Oh no…”
Will dismounts his horse once they are close enough and grins, “We’ll be taking your car now.”
The others get off their horses too, holding their weapons out, one of the soldiers walks to the front of the car and puts his hand out, “The thief is still alive, boss.”
“Good. Keep it that way.” Will says before turning back to taxi occupants, “Get on the dirt over there and get on your knees.”
Bow goes over and quickly checks on Glimmer as he quickly kneels down next to her while Adora slowly gets to her feet, her hand up as she slowly makes her way to the side of the road, “Look. No one needs to get hurt, okay? Just… let me help the driver.”
Will signals something to the soldier at the front of the car and then…
BANG!
The trio on the side of the road cover their ears in shock as the soldier walks back and nods to Will, “No need to help the driver now.” He narrows his eyes at the trio on the side of the road, “Now… what to do with you three…”
“I’ve got an idea boss!” One of the soldiers shouts out and makes a lewd gestures that makes the others laugh, “Come on, boss! When are we even going to get to another brothel?”
Adora glares at them and warns, “Take the car and leave us alone.”
“Or what, blondie?” Will snarks as on of his soldiers cockily approaches Adora.
“Or this!” Adora gets up and tackles the soldier down, Glimmer and Bow quickly rising to their feet to do the same as Will signals for his team to take them down.
Glimmer goes down first, a fist to the face knocks her to the ground, her head spinning with pain as Bow loses concentration and is kicked in the chest hard, before a haymaker makes contact with his head as well and he goes down to the ground next to Glimmer. Adora takes down two of the soldiers, but she’s completely outnumbered as they start to circle her with more people now that Glimmer and Bow are both down.
“Not bad, blondie.” Will snarks out as he gives the go ahead to attack, “Don’t worry, we won’t be gentle.”
Adora puts up a hell of a fight, but she’s unable to overturn the fact that’s she’s well and truly outnumbered, brought down to her knees as she’s pinned down, she grunts, trying kick and punch to no avail as Will steps in front of her, “Not a fair fight.” Adora spits out.
Will shrugs, “Don’t care.”
Adora watches as Will lifts a metal baton up with a grin, she shuts her eyes waiting for the baton to make contact…
Except, it doesn’t.
Instead, Will screams out as the grip on Adora loosens and she finds herself free. She looks around and sees Glimmer and Bow still collapsed on the side of the road, Glimmer looking after Bow as their attackers are drawn away from her, every single one of them.
The blonde pushes her up to her feet with great effort to find the 7 attackers, torn to shreds and scattered all over the road and roadside, one person stands in front of the turned around taxi, as Adora takes in the form of a magicat with short and hacked up hair, torn and ripped clothing and bloodied all over. The magicat turns around and heterochromatic eyes meet Adora’s grey blue ones for a moment before Catra’s eyes roll back from exhaustion and she starts to collapse.
Adora rushes over as fast as she can and manages to catch the magicat just before her head makes contact with the road. The magicat’s eyes open again briefly and breathes out, “Dying…”
“What?!” Adora panics with the magicat in her arms as she feels a large amount of a sticky substance just under the magicat’s torn jacket, over her ribs, she pulls her hand out and gasps at her completely bloodied hand and then feels the magicat go limp in her arms, “No… NO! Glimmer! Help!”