Song: Breezeblocks
by Alt-J (slowed)
__________________________
Kyle's POV
Chatter from the best friend's squad fills the room as we eat our breakfast. The table is huge and round, distancing them from me, Rogelio and Lonnie. Imp sits with his arms crossed on the table beside Lonnie's plate, but she ignores his pouting, her eyes fixed on my neck.
"Yikes, what happened there?"
She asks, reaching out to touch the small bruises. I smack her hand away and cover them with my hand, trying not to make the fact that I'm blushing that obvious. Lonnie frowns at me, and then to Rogelio, which tells her all she needs to know. Her confused look shifts to amusement in a matter of seconds.
"You're looking quite tired Kyle."
She teases. I shove another spoonful of porridge into my mouth and glare at her. Imp repeats her words with an even louder voice and I flinch, making Rogelio laugh into his toast.
The other four laughing across from us aren't paying attention to our conversation, so I decide to say something back to Lonnie.
"I'm tired because I was up half the night trying to figure out who He-Man is."
I say, very matter-of-factly. She covers Imp's ears and smirks as she replies.
"So was Ro trying to figure him out, too?"
She waves a finger towards my neck and then dares to wiggle her eyebrows at me. I groan and hide my face in my hands, letting Rogelio handle her. This I did not miss.
'Stop being so inappropriate!'
He growls at her. She opens her mouth to add something but he cuts her off.
'But yes, I was.'
My head snaps towards him with my mouth agape and Lonnie starts to laugh at me.
"Kyle."
The three of us look over at the others but they aren't facing us.
"Kyle."
Lonnie gasps and smiles at Imp.
"He said Kyle! He said Kyle in his own voice!"
Me and Rogelio smile to each other and then to him. My heart feels heavy for the little creature, especially when he crawls across Lonnie's lap to sit on mine. I laugh and give him a small hug.
"Kyle!"
We all laugh again. He stands up on top of my legs and decides to stick is finger right into one of the marks on my neck, making me yelp in pain.
"Ow!"
Lonnie can't control her laughter, and even Rogelio is trying to hold in his. Catra snickers from across the table and I immediately cover my neck with my hand again.
"Stop picking on me, pick on Ro!"
While the others are still talking Catra raises her eyebrows at me and taps her neck with a smirk. I push my empty bowl forwards and hide my head in my arms while they laugh at me still.
Although they're trying to embarrass me, it feels good. Not the embarrassment, but the fact that we can still have fun after all these years, and after all that's happened in the last while.
I can feel Rogelio patting my head and ruffling my hair up so I decide to stay with my head down for a while, hoping that Lonnie and Catra will back off.
For some reason my mind starts to fill up with horrible thoughts and questions that I haven't thought about since I escaped the ship.
Adora's my sister. Should I be talking to her more?
What if Astra is blowing somewhere else up right now?
How will we get the sword back from her?
'Kyle?'
I sit up and look at Rogelio, who's observing me with a worried frown. I smile and his frown slowly starts to fade. Lonnie has gone back to eating so I take one of his hands and kiss it like I did yesterday, sending tingles throughout my lips. He smiles at me and does the same thing to my hand.
"Alright you two we get it."
Lonnie says jokingly, punching me in the arm. I glare at her for what feels like the hundredth time today and am relieved when Bow calls across the table to us.
"Okay, so we were thinking... since Kyle can still use magic in the ship that must mean that She-Ra can, too."
He says. Lonnie shakes her head.
"But isn't her sword-"
"Her sword is still in there, yeah. So the problem must be that whatever restraints the sword is in is stopping Adora from conjuring it again."
I nod and glance over at Adora. I don't think I'll ever look at her the same way again. The only way I looked at her before was a friend, an old teammate from some of the worst years of my life, but now? She's literally my family, and it's strange.
She catches my gaze and smiles, forcing me to look away again.
"While you guys were gone to Razz yesterday, Bow and I went back to Entrapta's. She gave us all the information we need to get Astra out of here."
Glimmer says, smiling at all of us. We nod for her to continue, so she does.
"The ship has a cockpit, of course, at the furthest point from the entrance. In there-"
She clicks a button in the table and a pink holographic plan of the ship pops up, making us all jump.
"There's an override key. Since the ship is a first one's, all we need to do is stick either She-Ra or He-Man's sword in it, and the ship will go wherever you tell it to."
Sweat starts to form in beads on my forehead again.
"But if we tell it to go... won't we go with it? And what if Astra leaves herself while we're in there?"
Catra nods at my questions, agreeing with me for once. Bow sighs and and does something with the hologram so that it now shows us a long corridor.
"It'll be hard, but once you tell it to leave you'll have a minute to get out of there."
My chest feels heavy again.
"So we have to go in there, get She-Ra's sword, distract Astra, override the ship, and then escape?"
I ask. My voice is hopeful, hopeful that it's not going to be that difficult, but unfortunately Glimmer nods.
"We're sorry, Kyle, but being He-Man... well it's like She-Ra. There's a lot of responsibility."
I nod and fall back into the chair, my brain losing a fight to a hazy memory that comes to the front of my mind, drowning out the voices of discussion around me.
-
"Cadet Kyle. You are no longer permitted to run errands with Rogelio."
Shadow Weaver said. Her voice was drawn out at the end of her sentence and she spoke with her usual sing-song accent, only making everything worse.
Lonnie and Rogelio stood at each side of me but I felt alone, singled out. Shadow Weaver's eyes, or at least the eyes in her mask, got thinner and more slit-like as she waited for me to say something.
"Do you understand?"
I nodded and Lonnie glanced at me with pain in her eyes. Rogelio was staring at the floor feeling guilty, but what was there to be guilty for? All he did was hold my hand, and it was only for a couple of seconds before she found us.
"Sorry Shadow Weaver."
I mumbled. She waved her hand for Lonnie to leave and looked at Rogelio and I with what came off as disappointment, but was probably seething rage. She reached out and tapped the horde emblem on my uniform, making me feel squirmish.
"There's a lot of responsibility that comes with being a soldier, cadets. If you allow yourselves to be distracted like Catra and Adora..."
We glanced at each other but she snapped her fingers to get us to focus on her.
"We'll have to dispose of you."
-
'Do you understand?'
Her cold voice plays on repeat in my head and threatens to make me mad. Understanding. There's so much to understand, too much to understand. My mind races as I overthink, coming up with all of the horrible things that could go wrong with this 'mission'.
I want to be home again. I don't want to be He-Man, and I don't want to feel like a burden in Bright Moon anymore.
But I have no choice.
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───
Sorry if this is a little messy! It's hard to come up with ideas and plans lol.
-Rose 🌞