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virovac · 5 years

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Kyle’s Funeral

[ Man, I’m probably going to have to rewrite this to include more characters, huh? Most of this was written in season 2]

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Bow, Scorpia and Catra were the only ones willing, or able to give speeches

Bow talked about how it took him a few years after the war to fully understand what Kyle and the rest of the Horde orphans had experienced, only fully realizing the severity after working with the younger former cadets.

Scorpia spoke of Kyle's artwork, and how she regretted never getting to know one of the Horde's few other artists. She even showed those she thought were his best on a screen.

Lonnie tried to give a speech, but stopped after a few sentences; unable to continue.

Entrapta had planned to read out a list of things Shadow Weaver praised him on in her files, but was persuaded not to once it was explained most were backhanded compliments...and that no one wanted to think about Shadow Weaver. So she just sat in the audience.

Catra's was simple and to the point.

"He was smarter than anyone gave him credit for. There was a reason I cheated off him rather Rogelio or Adora."

****

The speeches were over, and people flitted about. Some went to view the open casket. Others like Adora, procrastinated.

“You know in a weird way, having you act disrespectful is kinda helping me cope.” Adora wore a smile of sad gratitude as she spoke.

Catra swirled her drink with a lazy twirling motion of the hand. “Better everyone be mad at me than focus on the sad.”

Adora shook her head. “I don’t think that will help the others. It will just distract them from getting closure. But you are helping me, so thanks and please don't try to cause trouble."

Catra calmly looked around, ready to drop this line of conversation.

She turned to Sea Hawk, who was looking at the options at the buffet.

"So how did you know the deceased?"

Sea Hawk jumped a bit, not having noticed her.

"Well, er, apparently I threw him. Unnecessarily, it turns out."

A dark grin sprouted on Catra's face.

"Pfft. Wow, I'm sure he'd really be happy to know you attended."

"Catra, be nice." Adora chastened. "He helped Entrapta try and track down Kyle where Kyle was born so he could be buried there."

"In the remains" was the unspoken part of that sentence. Knowing the Horde, It was doubtful Kyle came from anyplace that was still standing.

In the end, it was decided he would be placed in the cemetery closest to Lonnie's and Rogellio's apartment.

Catra didn't understand why they didn't just cremate Kyle like back in the Horde, but it wasn't her business.

Sea Hawk puffed out his chest and dramatically gave a mid-torso salute ."One of the saddest things that can happen for a sailor is to not be buried at home. I wish I had succeeded in helping this man to where he came from, but alas… the trail was too old and too cold"

After that there was some more brief smalltalk (the pirate got unusually open about his acceptance his body would likely never be recovered the day he met his end) then they let Sea Hawk be.

****

Sometime later Adora felt a question poke her brain. "Scorpia showed pictures of the art he left behind, some even from back in the Horde. I know he could probably swipe a pen; but where did Kyle get the supplies to do the colors?"

Catra looked uncomfortable, but tried to play it off with a shrug "I gave him our old stash right after Thaymore. Didn't have it in me to just throw it out."

Adora was a confusing mix of feelings. They had worked hard on developing that collection, grabbing anything they could find in the trash or fallen off a Horde transport that had been (in retrospect) bringing in ill-gained bounty.

But… it was nice to know that after their falling out at Thaymor, their prized collection still saw use.

****

Adora found Lonnie sitting on a rock, flicking through a datapad displaying scans of all of Kyle's drawings.

"You know, I always thought he wasn't all there. But... I think I'm emptier than he was. He had dreams. Not likely ones, but ... as the war went on the impossible seemed to happen every day."

Her gaze turned to the horizon.

"If he couldn't make it in peacetime, what chance do I have?

Adora could not stay silent at that.

"He wouldn't want you to think that way.".

Lonnie bit back some instinctual counter about "why does that matter?".

She changed the subject.

"Grizzlor's old team sent a card."

Adora paused. "Aren't they all in prison?"

"For war crimes?" she thought.

There was a lot of stuff going unspoken today.

Lonnie brushed that off ."Yeah, apparently Kyle used to hang around them a lot when he wasn't hiding behind us. He was their "team mascot.' They'd bask in his admiration and tell him stories. "

Adora felt herself thrown a bit at this new knowledge. That seemed like such a big thing not to be in the loop of.

"And no one knew about this?"

Lonnnie shrugged.

"Rogelio did, but he didn't think it was important. But that's why he was always able to find Kyle. Its from them Kyle got the description to make a drawing of you and Swift Wind."

Adora gasped. "Kyle drew a picture of us?! While in the Horde?!"

"We didn't know you were She-Ra yet back then, okay? It was right after you fought them outside the woods" Lonnie rolled her eyes.

Lonnie found a smile creeping up on her face.

"Can you believe he actually put it on his locker to try and look tough? Having a "scary princess" on it? Probably a good thing Catra tore it up so he didn't get accused of being a sympathizer."

"Actually, I would have liked to have seen it,'' Adora responded in a flat tone. She herself couldn't tell if she was actually wistful or just saying something nice.

Silence followed. The well of conversation was running dry, yet the emotions were not leaving.

Lonnie dredged up a memory from something Kyle had told her a few months before it all happened.

"Apparently, Grizzlor once tried to reassure him by saying it took him until he was 400 years old before anyone thought he was worth something."

That was so horrible, it was funny. The secondhand embarrassment from the terrible attempt to cheer Kyle up seemed to call across time and space. Soon Adora and Lonnie were snickering than full on laughing.

Then mutual sobbing.

Lonnie felt a strange pressure, and opened her eyes to find Adora's arms around her.

Lonnie sighed.

"You turned into a real hugger after leaving the Horde, Adora. I'm not sure I like it."

****

Swift Wind gazed upon the body in the casket.

Sea Hawk stood beside him, the only change in self-declared pirate's usual wear was his honorary Rebellion naval hat he never wore anywhere before. He held the hat against his chest now.

Swift Wind had also kept things simple, having Bright Moon tailors make him a simple black necktie.

He had thought about a different more... horse outfit; but the only funeral wear for horses he could find was simply for draft horses pulling hearse carriages. And he just didn't think they would look right. He wasn't a draft horse, and he wasn't planning on pulling anything.

His thoughts turned back to what was in front of him.

...It was amazing how Entrapta had managed to put it back together so well after her overly-thorough autopsy.

Kyle's body was dressed in clothing in inspired by what Salineas placed its sailors in before giving them a burial at sea. Though they were far away from the ocean, so the colors chosen had been more earthy tones, and there were some changes made of course to keep it from being too much like the source of inspiration.

Kyle's herd had suggested it after talking with Sea Hawk. Apparently Kyle had always been happiest in the Horde when on sea missions.

Swift Wind felt it was so weird in hindsight how Adora had never talked to him about her first herd. He felt like he should know more about this person.

Scratch that, everything today was so weird.

Funerals were weird. He had never felt more self-conscious in his life.

It had been awkward when he had yawned during one of the speeches, and Queen Angella had to explain that yawning in horses was a stress response rather than boredom.

(He had to admit she picked up a lot of knowledge in her long life.)

He never felt more separated from his peers than before this day. He knew the builder species occasionally talked to inanimate objects like they could understand them, and here in this place it seemed socially expected for one to address a corpse or grave like it could hear you. It was odd and confusing.

Still, he could give it a try.

"You know, while I love being a grand adventuring hero, I had it pretty good as normal horse.

...But, you seemed to have had it pretty bad."

He paused.

Sea Hawk placed a comforting hand on the equine's back. It was reassuring, it helped him feel like he had as much right to be here as any other person. He continued.

"I know how it feels to have people think you're annoying. Sometimes I feel people only put up with me because of my speed and strength and they otherwise wouldn't want me around."

A strange thought occurred to him, it was overpowering and selfless and scary, and seemed ridiculous.

"I think... if I could go back and make it so you got transformed into Adora's steed instead of me... I would."

It was a dumb thought. Time couldn't go backwards. But a pressure seemed to lift from inside him after saying that. He felt calmer.

Swift Wind felt he understood the purpose of graveyards a little better now.

****

Adora came back to find Bow sitting in a chair and talking to Catra while the latter feigned disinterest.

"It's not like I should have been expected to be sympathetic at the time to someone who had kidnapped me and just helped pulled off a terrorist attack."

He paused realizing who he was talking to.

Catra smirked humorlessly. "Continue."

Bow decided to just power through it.

"And I had Glimmer on my mind-

-but I thought of myself as a hero. And heroes are supposed to go above and beyond being merely decent. And I dismissed someone obviously in distress. And he was trying to help me as much as he felt safe doing so."

Catra gave a 'hmph'.

"You can't care about everyone and everything all at once or you'll go crazy. I wouldn't have gotten as far as I had if I did that."

"That is the exact opposite of comforting, Catra." Bow didn't even bother glaring at her. Just kept the same contemplative expression while looking at his hands.

Catra thought that over.

"Yeah, I guess it is; sorry."

Adora decided not to interrupt and directed her attention to those around her.

Rogelio was mostly motionless in a group of other people when Lonnie, who came back with Adora, joined him. He didn't really know anyone else here and looked thankful at Lonnie's return.

The exact nature of his bond with Kyle was always confusing in hindsight to Adora. Much less clearer than her and Catra's or his friendship with Lonnie. She wondered if either had understood it. It was dependable, but grew colder with age.

They had all grown less warm towards Kyle as they got older, she thought. As the Horde's grip grew tighter in their minds, they became less patient with him. And as they got less patient, his performance worsened.

He really only was kept on because he was good at written portions of the tests, and because Shadow Weaver liked to use him to berate everyone else.

"I see once again Kyle is the only one taking the lesson seriously," the sorceress would often say.

Adora knew apparently the two tried to turn things romantic after she left the Horde...but it fizzled out after the war ended.

She remembered asking Rogelio about that. He had just sadly growled that outside the Horde, Kyle had better options than someone like him.

****

Catra felt empty headed, yet also somehow like her skull was stuffed to the brim at the same time. She had never thought much of Kyle. But she never really thought about anyone in her squad except Adora. She had let Adora be her entire world, let the cruelty of the Horde make her treat Adora as her only refuge.

Yet there had been another outsider, one who had never done anything mean to her, another possible ally, in easy reach the whole time.

She regretted not trying.

****

He wasn't the best of them.

He wasn't the worst of them.

He was just a person who hadn't been treated as a person should.

She had said the squad had been her family to Glimmer once.

Now that felt hollow and comical.

She stared one last time at the grave.

Adora knew she'd never be able to move on from this completely. The only guilt she had ever managed to full break free from was that she was directly made to feel by Shadow Weaver. Any other guilt... it always found its way back

"I'm sorry."

She paused

"I'll try- no I will be better."

She felt something more was needed.

She took out her sword.

"For the Honor of Grayskull" she whispered softly.

She-Ra kneeled before the grave. Adora had never been one to think being She-Ra being made her better.

But maybe acknowledgment from the revered and mighty She-Ra could in some small way, partly make up for everything.

Angella touched her shoulder. She-Ra turned gazed into the woman's eyes

She leaned into the angel's maternal hug.

It was time to go.

#spop fanfic #spop fic #implied suicide #tw suicide #funeral fanfic #funeral fic #character study #swift wind (spop)

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