Chapter Text
Adora didn’t know why she was doing this. Why would she even turn down her girlfriend’s offer to join her at the centennial Horde masquerade? There was just so much she had to work on; training times to cut down, moves to perfect, she didn’t have time to “let loose”, as Catra would say, and attend a celebration . But what she wasn’t expecting was for all the the training simulations to be closed for the day. Apparently this party was a big thing.
‘I know, I’ll just surprise Catra there! She’ll be so happy to see me.’ Adora thinks to herself. There’s only a little over an hour until the masquerade, which means she has to put something together rather quickly in order to fit the theme.
Back in her room, the blonde looks around for anything she can use for the formal event. In scanning the room, her eyes fall upon one of the long, crimson curtains swaying against the slightly-opened window. She strides over and carefully removes the cloth from the rod, setting it vertically against the windowpane. If there’s anything Adora’s learned from her years of training, it’s how to be resourceful.
The fabric was perfect, especially because she knew Catra would love the deep red contrasting elegantly against her light complexion, while also matching the feline woman’s typical attire. Adora’s mind wanders to what the beautiful woman could possibly be wearing tonight and she felt her stomach erupt into butterflies at the speculation. ‘Snap out of it! You won’t even get to find out if you don’t have anything to wear.’
Deft fingers quickly started working to cut and sew the curtain into a flowing gown, fit for the occasion. An hour later, the dress was ready and the soldier wasted no time trying it on and walking to the mirror. The garment was perfect; her torso was hugged tightly by the silky material, her arms and shoulders exposed, as well as the blades of her back. It ran from a cuff around the neck down to the floor, only starting to loosen up and flow at her waist.
Still, something was missing, though. It felt plain. Wanting to maintain an elegant but simple look, Adora ran to her closet and pulled out a gold belt to wrap around her midsection and complement her blonde locks.
“Perfect!” she called out to herself. Now to get the mask portion of this outfit down.
Adora decides to decorate one of her broken training faceplates in the time crunch. About half an hour later, she’s standing at her desk looking at the finished product. The black mask covers the left side of her face from above the eyebrow down to just under her cheekbone, across her nose, to slope up to just above her right cheekbone and around her other eye. Gold flecks of glitter and gemstones twinkle from the light streaming in from the now-bare window. With her hair flowing loose, Adora could barely recognize herself in the mirror. She really looked stunning.
‘ Oh Catra’s really in for a surprise, and I’m not too late!’ she thinks while glancing at the clock on the wall, smirking to herself.
The unintentionally heavily-disguised blonde makes her way to the banquet hall, which is decorated with streamers, balloons, banners, and everything else imaginable. The lighting is dim, which only adds to the mysterious nature of the event. There are tables scattered along the outskirts on the hall, some holding vast amounts of food and drinks, others prepared for people to sit. In the center of the room, a huge crowd of people dance to the upbeat music coming from a string band off to the side of the dancefloor.
With no sign of Catra yet, Adora decides to grab a few of the appetizers and sit down at an empty table while she waits. Not even ten minutes after sitting down, Adora hears the distinct laughter of her lover and turns to see her standing by the drink bar.
Only, Catra wasn’t alone. She had some other woman hanging off of her every word.
Adora has never seen this pretty woman in her life. Short white hair sits atop an androgynous and shapely face, a tight black dress runs down her burly body, and crimson stones adorn her hips and ears. The woman has a black mask on, only covering around her eyes which allows Adora to take in her black lipstick and light use of makeup. All in all, this woman was a bombshell.
‘Catra would be insane to choose me over her, I didn’t even know she asked anyone else.’
Reminding herself of who she came to the ball for, Adora takes in what Catra is wearing. Her girlfriend is sporting a burgundy tuxedo with a lighter-shaded dress shirt underneath, the piping of her blazer matching it perfectly. Around her neck hangs an undone burgundy bowtie, which sends an even hotter wave of jealousy through Adora’s body thinking of why the woman looks slightly dishevelled.
As if reading her mind, Catra glances past the other woman and makes eye contact with Adora. The blonde doesn’t notice the feline’s smirk as she’s too busy trying not to rip the mystery woman’s head off, but she notices when Catra leans in close to her date’s ear to whisper something.
The snowy-haired woman nods and they both start walking towards Adora’s table.
“Excuse me, miss?” Catra purrs, “Do you mind if we sit here?” The close proximity allows Adora to take in the small, black smudge on Catra’s shirt collar and the tips of a few of her clawed fingers, which causes her to seethe even more.
“Uh-- yeah of course, go ahead.” the only inhabitant of the table manages to choke out, barely able to recognize her own voice.
“Cool, I’m Catra and this is my friend Scorpia.” she accentuates by pointing as she talks. Scorpia chuckles at the word ‘friend’ and Adora doesn’t want anything more than to slap that smirk off her face.
By now, Adora realizes that Catra doesn’t even recognize her and decides to play along. It’s not every day she can spy on her girlfriend who may or may not have betrayed her by touching another. She’s just using this to find out more about her girlfriend and this mysterious Scorpia’s intentions with her Catra.
“Nice to meet you both, I’m-- Adela.” Adora lies easily, trying not to dwell on the jealousy and anger rippling through her body. She flashes a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes as Catra stares fondly at her. Scorpia notices this and places her hand on the feline’s forearm to get her attention.
“I’m gonna run to the bathroom and say hi to my friends over there, I’ll find you when I’m done.” the foreign woman says, her eyes looking into Catra’s way too long for Adora to be comfortable with. By this point, Adora doesn’t know whether she wants to cry or scream at the nonchalant way her girlfriend takes affection from another.
She knows Catra has always been flirtatious, but she never expected to witness this behavior up close and in such bad nature. Has she been a fool to believe that Catra could be satisfied by her and her alone? Was she getting played this whole time? No, that couldn’t be. ‘Catra loves me, Catra loves me, Catra loves me .’ Adora repeats in her head like a mantra. It didn’t stop her mind from conjuring up images of her beloved temptress with her claws caressing the locks of someone that wasn’t her, kissing them with the tenderness the blonde thought was only for her.
Adora is only snapped out of her turmoil when Catra places her hand over her own on the table and flashes the infamous smirk that would normally make her weak in the knees. First, Catra brings another woman to the celebration, and now she’s trying to hit on another woman who isn’t even supposed to be her? She was gonna have a lot of explaining to do.
“Would you like to dance with me, Adela? You look like you could use something to take your mind off of whatever’s on it.”
“Sure.” Adora shrugs noncommittally and rises out of her seat to take the furry hand offered to her.
As the current song ends, a slow and romantic song starts permeating through the air. Catra bashfully smiles and moves to wrap one arm around the blonde’s lower back and the other reaches to intertwine her fingers with Adora’s.
“Is this okay?” she asks, suddenly out of character and vulnerable . Adora can’t help but smile at the other woman’s demeanor, until she realizes the softness wasn’t really aimed at her. She settles on nodding while wrapping her free arm around Catra’s neck. It catches her off guard when the brunette woman tugs her closer, their bodies almost flush. Adora feels the taut muscles of Catra’s abdomen rippling with every breath she takes, as well as her defined arms through the dress shirt. A deep, rumbling purr starts emitting from the cat’s chest.
“You look so beautiful tonight, I can’t help but admire the most breathtaking woman I’ve ever laid eyes on.” the feline husks sweetly into the blonde’s ear. They’re moving around the dancefloor with Catra leading every step.
“Don’t you have a girlfriend you should be dancing with? I don’t think she’d appreciate you hitting on me.” Adora spits in an accusatory tone as she fails to keep the bitterness out of her voice. Oh boy, was she angry.
Catra has the nerve to chuckle as she unwraps her arm from the blonde’s body in order to twirl her.
“You’re right, I do have a girlfriend. Scorpia’s not the one I want to be here with, though, if she’s who you’re referring to. Let me take you back to my room and I can show you just who it is that I want.”
Adora feels every emotion running rampant down to her core. Did she hear that correctly? Take her back to her room? Her world crashes around her and a tear runs down her cheek, hidden by the mask. She doesn’t care if her girlfriend sees it anyway, she’s completely heartbroken.
Catra stills their movements, bringing her hands to softly cup Adora’s downcast face. Adora’s forced to make eye contact with the blue and yellow eyes of her supposed lover. Catra’s resolve breaks when she finally noticed the tear stained eyes in front of her.
“Adora, I know it’s you under there.” she steadily breathes out, “I knew it was you all along, silly.”
The pair of blue eyes widen, still brimming with tears. “What-- how? How did you know? You acted like you didn’t. You-- you wanted to be here with someone else.”
“You could be in the best disguise in all of Etheria and I would always know it was you, Adora. I was just trying to get a rise out of you. At least, until I actually upset you.” Knowing that the cat’s affection was not misplaced is enough to dissipate most of the jealousy and sadness that has afflicted Adora since Catra walked into the room with her friend. Still, there’s more that just isn’t adding up.
The blonde grabs her companion by the collar.
“Then why did you allow that, that distasteful woman’s advances and come in here looking like that .” Adora’s anger flares up again, and rightfully so. She will not be made a fool of .
“I didn’t wanna bother you because you said you were busy!” she gestures to her bowtie hanging loosely around her neck. “You know I can’t tie these myself and I felt weird asking Scorpia to do it. That’s our thing...” Catra continues. “You usually always help me get ready.” she adds in a smaller voice, looking down embarrassed.
“Oh yeah? Then why do you have her lipstick all over you?” Adora pleads, hoping that there’s a plausible explanation. She can tell Catra hasn’t lied to her yet, she knows her girlfriend’s tells too well.
“That?” Catra asks, gesturing to the smudge on her collar. “Oh, I must’ve wiped it on my shirt after i helped Scorpia with her eyeliner. She asked me to help with her wings.”
Coming from anyone else, that would’ve sounded awfully suspicious, but the feline’s eyes were brimming with the love and adoration that they always have. Adora should've known her girlfriend didn't have the intentions of cheating on her. After all these years, the blonde has only fallen more and more in love with her girlfriend, and now was no exception. She only hoped the same was true from her other half.
“I should warn you though, Scorpia may have a bit of a crush on me.”
As if to prove a point, Adora sees Scorpia making her way towards them and pulls the brunette into a kiss that’s definitely not appropriate for the event they’re at. Even though she knows Catra is hers, she still can’t help but feel a residual jealousy. Adora’s tongue swipes against Catra’s bottom lip, asking for entrance, which she gratefully obliges to. The blonde woman kisses her girlfriend deeply, taking control and breaking the kiss after Catra whimpers and starts purring even louder.
She needs her girlfriend to herself, and now. Before Scorpia can make it over to the couple, Adora throws Catra over her shoulder and starts walking briskly towards the exit, effectively stopping Scorpia in her tracks.
Adora was going to make sure that Catra and everyone else in the Fright Zone knew who she belonged to. She was on a mission and nothing would stop her from proving that point over and over again tonight.