Words: 1060 (this really got away from me) Fandom: She-Ra and the Princess of Power (2018) Ship: Adora/Catra
Catra finishes putting the finishing touches on the soulmark, peeling the prep paper off carefully so it doesn't smudge. Hopefully the girl from Craigslist was able to figure out how to apply it from her instructions - she tried to make them as idiot proof as possible, but she's painfully aware of how creatively people can fuck things up. Her normal fare is simpler than this, but there's always someone who manages to fuck it up.
Making coverups for soulmarks isn't as lucrative as other jobs, and she's glad of that, really. Most of her clients are covering soulbonds that went south for one reason or another - death, abuse, irreconcilable differences that their biology didn't account for. The only clients that don't have a painful story are the escorts. They say a soulmark chills business, but Catra knows how to make it disappear, at least for a week or so.
A lot of her clients assume she's covering a soulmark, and she doesn't correct them.
Anyway. It pays enough to cover rent and canned soup, but when someone reached out to ask if she could fake a soulmark instead of covering it, she was interested enough to bite. So now she was applying her fraudulent soulmark, a rich golden splash, and hoping she can fix anything the client messed up. Grayskull didn't have time beforehand for Catra to do it, and she hasn't frantically texted yet, so she has to assume everything's fine.
She just has to put on the suit she had to buy for Scorpia's wedding and get through a few hours of some holiday party or something. Piece of cake, and it'll pay her rent through the winter. Maybe the escorts are onto something.
She's not giving someone from the internet her address, so she's loitering in front of the library when the car stops. It's older than she would have expected, streaks of dirt speckling along the back, almost obscuring the bumper stickers. If she hadn't gotten half of the fee as an advance, Catra wouldn't have believed this is Grayskull's car, but when the window rolls down she can see the golden soulmark at the base of the neck, just above the collarbone. It looks real - if Catra wasn't looking for it, she wouldn't see the slight texture that betrays its nature.
"Are you Catra?" Grayskull asks, stress in her voice, and - yeah. She's hired a stranger to pretend to be her girlfriend. Catra would be anxious too if she had anything other than money on the line.
"The very same." Catra drops into the passenger seat, and at least the car is cleaner inside than outside. Grayskull is - hot, with lean muscle unmistakeable where her dress reveals her shoulders, skin so flawless it seems to glow. Catra's makeup is perfect, but she has to stop herself from checking it.
"Thanks for doing this," Grayskull says. "They just will not get off my back. The mark was super easy to put on and it looks so good, next time I can probably do this without you."
Catra ignores the flare of disappointment. She doesn't even know this person, she can think with her libido later when this is over and she's home. "So, Grayskull, how'd we meet?"
"First of all," Grayskull says, "if we're dating I assume you call me Adora? That's my name. No one calls me anything else."
"I was just going to call you increasingly sappy pet names all night. Will that work for you, princess?"
Adora's face darkens. Catra's going to make enough money to replace her crap desk chair and have fun. "Sure, uh, kitten."
Hot and awkward. Oh no. "Okay, so you're not convincing at all. Stick to your strengths, which I assume you have."
"Escrima," Adora says, "which, to answer your question, is how we met." She must sense her confusion even with her eyes on the road, because she says, "It's a martial art, I train with a sword. You're not going to have to talk about it, no one will let me talk about it and I want to."
"Never heard of it," Catra says, and Adora launches into a clearly long-stored explanation, and when Catra unfocuses her eyes she can see it, sweat on her brow, hands tight on the hilt of a blade. She's never seen a kalimpan, and she doesn't recognize a number of the words Adora's using to describe it, but she wants to see one, now. Maybe she can get Adora to show someone a picture before the evening is over.
They're parked too soon. When Adora's done smoothing her dress, Catra holds out her hand. Adora eyes it, and Catra says, "I mean, we ought to sell it, right?"
Adora takes her hand, and the skin over her collarbone buzzes with a sensation she's never felt, and goddamn it, it's on the opposite side from the fake one. Catra can barely focus on the fact that this cute weirdo has been assigned to her by fate or whatever because she's way too annoyed that she's wasted all that time designing the fakes, that of course are on the same side.
Adora gasps next to her. "This isn't hap-"
"Yeah, sugar, apparently it's happening." Even the sound of Adora wincing at the name doesn't help. "I have my kit in the car, hopefully my shit will only take long enough to get off for us to be fashionably late."
"Wait." Adora faces her, reaches for her other hand. "We're soulmates. You - I don't want to go to the party anymore. I just want to get to know you."
The majority of the soulbonds Catra sees have ended badly. Catra's not naive enough to believe that a soulbond means anything more than an ugly tattoo two people share. But Scorpia looks at Perfuma like she hung the moon, and Catra's never seen her happier. When she sees the mark on Adora, blue and yellow swirl with a jagged edge that she can't make sense of - she's never felt possessive like this before. What does she have to lose, really?
"If you really want to waste my acting talents, snookums, I guess it's your loss."
Adora smiles and it feels like she's looking at the sun and Catra will have to keep her busted desk chair for a little longer, it looks like.
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FILL: TEAM CATRADORA
Date: 2023-09-07 02:37 am (UTC)Fandom: She-Ra and the Princess of Power (2018)
Ship: Adora/Catra
Catra finishes putting the finishing touches on the soulmark, peeling the prep paper off carefully so it doesn't smudge. Hopefully the girl from Craigslist was able to figure out how to apply it from her instructions - she tried to make them as idiot proof as possible, but she's painfully aware of how creatively people can fuck things up. Her normal fare is simpler than this, but there's always someone who manages to fuck it up.
Making coverups for soulmarks isn't as lucrative as other jobs, and she's glad of that, really. Most of her clients are covering soulbonds that went south for one reason or another - death, abuse, irreconcilable differences that their biology didn't account for. The only clients that don't have a painful story are the escorts. They say a soulmark chills business, but Catra knows how to make it disappear, at least for a week or so.
A lot of her clients assume she's covering a soulmark, and she doesn't correct them.
Anyway. It pays enough to cover rent and canned soup, but when someone reached out to ask if she could fake a soulmark instead of covering it, she was interested enough to bite. So now she was applying her fraudulent soulmark, a rich golden splash, and hoping she can fix anything the client messed up. Grayskull didn't have time beforehand for Catra to do it, and she hasn't frantically texted yet, so she has to assume everything's fine.
She just has to put on the suit she had to buy for Scorpia's wedding and get through a few hours of some holiday party or something. Piece of cake, and it'll pay her rent through the winter. Maybe the escorts are onto something.
She's not giving someone from the internet her address, so she's loitering in front of the library when the car stops. It's older than she would have expected, streaks of dirt speckling along the back, almost obscuring the bumper stickers. If she hadn't gotten half of the fee as an advance, Catra wouldn't have believed this is Grayskull's car, but when the window rolls down she can see the golden soulmark at the base of the neck, just above the collarbone. It looks real - if Catra wasn't looking for it, she wouldn't see the slight texture that betrays its nature.
"Are you Catra?" Grayskull asks, stress in her voice, and - yeah. She's hired a stranger to pretend to be her girlfriend. Catra would be anxious too if she had anything other than money on the line.
"The very same." Catra drops into the passenger seat, and at least the car is cleaner inside than outside. Grayskull is - hot, with lean muscle unmistakeable where her dress reveals her shoulders, skin so flawless it seems to glow. Catra's makeup is perfect, but she has to stop herself from checking it.
"Thanks for doing this," Grayskull says. "They just will not get off my back. The mark was super easy to put on and it looks so good, next time I can probably do this without you."
Catra ignores the flare of disappointment. She doesn't even know this person, she can think with her libido later when this is over and she's home. "So, Grayskull, how'd we meet?"
"First of all," Grayskull says, "if we're dating I assume you call me Adora? That's my name. No one calls me anything else."
"I was just going to call you increasingly sappy pet names all night. Will that work for you, princess?"
Adora's face darkens. Catra's going to make enough money to replace her crap desk chair and have fun. "Sure, uh, kitten."
Hot and awkward. Oh no. "Okay, so you're not convincing at all. Stick to your strengths, which I assume you have."
"Escrima," Adora says, "which, to answer your question, is how we met." She must sense her confusion even with her eyes on the road, because she says, "It's a martial art, I train with a sword. You're not going to have to talk about it, no one will let me talk about it and I want to."
"Never heard of it," Catra says, and Adora launches into a clearly long-stored explanation, and when Catra unfocuses her eyes she can see it, sweat on her brow, hands tight on the hilt of a blade. She's never seen a kalimpan, and she doesn't recognize a number of the words Adora's using to describe it, but she wants to see one, now. Maybe she can get Adora to show someone a picture before the evening is over.
They're parked too soon. When Adora's done smoothing her dress, Catra holds out her hand. Adora eyes it, and Catra says, "I mean, we ought to sell it, right?"
Adora takes her hand, and the skin over her collarbone buzzes with a sensation she's never felt, and goddamn it, it's on the opposite side from the fake one. Catra can barely focus on the fact that this cute weirdo has been assigned to her by fate or whatever because she's way too annoyed that she's wasted all that time designing the fakes, that of course are on the same side.
Adora gasps next to her. "This isn't hap-"
"Yeah, sugar, apparently it's happening." Even the sound of Adora wincing at the name doesn't help. "I have my kit in the car, hopefully my shit will only take long enough to get off for us to be fashionably late."
"Wait." Adora faces her, reaches for her other hand. "We're soulmates. You - I don't want to go to the party anymore. I just want to get to know you."
The majority of the soulbonds Catra sees have ended badly. Catra's not naive enough to believe that a soulbond means anything more than an ugly tattoo two people share. But Scorpia looks at Perfuma like she hung the moon, and Catra's never seen her happier. When she sees the mark on Adora, blue and yellow swirl with a jagged edge that she can't make sense of - she's never felt possessive like this before. What does she have to lose, really?
"If you really want to waste my acting talents, snookums, I guess it's your loss."
Adora smiles and it feels like she's looking at the sun and Catra will have to keep her busted desk chair for a little longer, it looks like.