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Chapter Text

“You okay now?” Marco asked Star, offering another tissue. She’d been crying for almost ten minutes, but it seemed like she was finally calming down. Both of them were sitting on Marco’s bed.

“Well… I still feel really guilty, about a lot of stuff, actually.” Star paused for a moment, taking the tissue from Marco. “But I guess that’s sort of the point?”

“More or less,” Kar said. “That overwhelming feeling of guilt will probably last for, I don’t know, the rest of your life?”

“Oh, great…” Star said half-heartedly.

‘Great. Now she’s just as miserable as we are, and it’s unanimously our fault.’ Marco thought, placing his hand on Star’s shoulder in an attempt to comfort her. ‘You joking about it isn’t making things better.’

Kar sighed, but kept his attention on Star.

Well, sitting there and wallowing wasn’t going to fix anything, so Marco tried to change the subject. “So, we’ve been up here for awhile. I wonder what our folks are talking about…”

“Hey Star, whatcha thinking about?” Kar asked nonchalantly, as if Marco wasn’t even in the room with them.

Star looked up at Kar. “Huh? What I’m thinking?”

“Well, I can’t read your mind, so I’m asking. This is what I assume everyone asks when they want to know what someone is thinking. A very normal question that normal people ask. Now answer the magic tentacle arm,” Kar said.

Star smiled ever so slightly. “Uh, okay.” She scratched the back of her head. “I’m thinking about the night Marco got captured by Toffee, and how there’s a million other things I could’ve done to stop that whole disaster. Like, if I grabbed his remote instead of giving up, or if I just incapacitated him long enough to grab Marco and run for it, or if I hadn’t brought Marco on a stupid life-threatening adventure for a sandwich that morning, or… I don’t know…”

“Exactly. You don’t know. Marco plays ‘what-if-I’ games all the time, but it doesn’t matter what you could’ve done. What happened is what happened. You can just learn from the past and move on to the future.”

“Wow. That was… actually really sage-like, Kar,” Marco said. Sometimes he really did underestimate the demon.

“I have my moments,” Kar said.

Star cracked another smile. “I guess you’re right.” She stood up and stretched. “Alright, I feel a lot better. Thanks.”

“Already?” Marco asked.

She turned towards Marco and Kar with a renewed energy and spirit. “Yeah, I appreciate you guys trying to cheer me up, but it feels like I keep making every little thing about me and my problems.”

“Star, it’s not like your problems aren't important,” Marco said. “Yes, Kar and I are pretty fucked up, but we’ve been dealing with that for years. Your problems don’t have to take a backseat to our perpetual issues.”

“I get that, but I decided that I wanted to help you get better, not dump my problems on you,” Star said. “My feelings can be worked on later. Right now I want to work on those ‘perpetual issues’ of yours.”

She took a deep breath.

“So... I guess I should go the Kar route and just ask, huh?” She looked at Marco. “What do you want to do? What would make you happier? Besides, you know, getting that memory spell fixed ASAP.”

Marco didn’t know what that last word was, but he disregarded it and thought for a moment. There were a lot of things that could potentially make him happier. Getting his adult body could be one, but that would likely end up causing more problems than it was worth. He could go on crazy adventures again, but his parents would worry, and he’d be missing out on Earth, the place he literally just came back to. He wanted to at least spend some years on Earth and figure out his life here.

That led to another option, though. One that he had been thinking about since his conversation with Moon. It was illegal and dangerous, but that was part of what made it an exciting opportunity. Not to mention the fact that he was the only person who could do it, hypothetically, by the fact that he was the first human to earn scissors. It sounded like a long shot, but he might as well say it out loud and set the idea in stone.

'Woah. Are you sure about this? She is Moon’s kid, after all,’ Kar thought.

'Out of everyone in this world, I trust Star the most. If anyone's going to hear it first, it’s her,’ Marco thought. 'Are you against the idea?’

'I… don't know. Doing something like this seems risky and complicated. But if you think it will help people… I mean… fuck, man, go for it. I have your back.’

Marco smiled and gave Kar a brief glance. 'Thank you.’

‘Anytime.’

Marco looked Star in the eyes and said, “I want to integrate magic into Earth society.”

Star blinked and then raised an eyebrow. “Uh, what?” She wasn’t prepared to hear an answer like that. Hell, she probably expected something along the lines of a glass of water, not to help him flip his dimension upside down with magic.

‘Do you think she even knows? This is a conspiracy, after all,' Kar thought.

Right, there was a high chance she didn’t know anything about Earth’s ban on magic.

“I was talking to your mom, and found out the Magical High Commission made it illegal for Earth to be part of the multiverse or know about magic. I think that’s stupid and unfair, so I want to teach the people of Earth magic. It could do a lot of good here.”

“It’s illegal to do magic here? Does that mean I’ve been breaking the law this whole time?” Star asked, and then smiled defiantly. “Punk rock!”

“I mean, the High Commission doesn't care about you because you're royalty, and training with magic was sort of the point of you coming here. You can’t break the law if you are the law.”

She frowned. “That’s less punk rock.”

Marco smiled. “Yeah, I suppose.”

Star looked back up at him. “So you want to convince the High Commission to bring magic to Earth?”

“Not… exactly,” Marco said, with a pinch of guilt. “Your mom heavily implied that they are pretty steadfast on the rule, and it’s been going for millenium. They aren’t going to just change it because a teenage boy wanted them to.”

Star frowned. “Then what are you planning on doing?”

“I’m going to do it... personally. Of course, if I tried to do something like this, the High Commission would, uh, arrest me, I guess.” Or execute him. “Once the memory spell gets fixed and things start to calm down, I’d basically be doing this behind everyone’s back.”

“So we’d be doing this all undercover-like?” Star asked, a spark of excitement in her eyes.

“Yup,” Marco said. “The High Commission doesn’t seem to keep close tabs on Earth and the gritty details of what’s going on here, judging by how many magical slip-ups there’s been already, so I figure if we’re careful we can get a lot of magic going before they even realize, and by the time that happens, you might be queen, so you could probably either keep it under wraps even better, or maybe even convince the Commission to let it go unregulated.”

“Till I’m queen? Wow, this would take a long time…” Star frowned, and seemed to be considering just how big of a favor this was.

‘She might need a little more convincing,’ Kar thought.

‘I’m not going to manipulate her into doing this. It’s her choice.’

Marco grabbed Star’s hand to catch her attention. She looked just as surprised as the last time Marco did this, but now it was of his own volition.

“Star, I want you to know that I’m not trying to pressure you into doing anything reckless. Don't do this for my sake. If you think it’s a bad idea, it’s okay to say 'no.’ And if you don't want me to risk my own ass by doing this, say the words and I’ll never pursue this. You wanted to know what I wanted here and now. Well, this is it, but it’s not the only thing that will make me happy here.”

“Just the thing that’ll make you happiest,” Star said with a smirk. “Okay, I’m in.”

“Oh! Really?” Marco asked. He didn’t really expect this to be so easy. “Are you sure? If your mom found out-“

“Marco, I do weird stuff behind my mom’s back all the time. It’s like second nature by now,” Star said. “Besides, unlike those stupid adventures we went on, this’ll actually help people, right? So what’s not to like about it?”

“I… um…” Marco was so close to hugging Star again. He was worried his idea would be dismissed immediately. Not that he would blame her if she did, but the fact that she understood his perspective, saw the benefits of his plan, and wanted to help him immediately showed how she truly was his greatest ally in all this.

This was actually happening. Marco finally found his reason to be on Earth!

'Was it everything you wanted and more?’ Kar thought.

Star let go of Marco’s hand and threw some confetti in the air with her wand. “Oh man, this is going to be so much fun! Earth was already the greatest place ever, but now it’ll have magic . Everyone will love it!”

Her excitement was contagious. Marco laughed. “Trust me, Star, it’s gonna be great. Just imagine the benefits. With levitation, things like carpentry will become ten times safer. Alchemy will make cooking meals faster. Entire diseases could be wiped out with the right incantations.”

Star smiled wide, but then it softened into a frown. “But wait. How are we going to bring magic to Earth? I don’t think you thought this through.”

“We’re going to teach people how to do magic,” Marco said.

“But how? I can only use my wand, and you only know the ritual-things, which you are not going to teach anyone.”

“What? No, of course not.” Marco was fairly confident that he would be taking those specific hand gestures to his grave. Teaching those would be a good way to fuck the world completely. He didn’t even trust himself with them. “I can teach them regular old contemporary magic.”

“Con-what magic?”

“Like your wand magic, but weaker and without the wand,” Kar explained. “The shit that everyone else is left dealing with.”

Star’s eyes lit up. “Wandless magic? You mean like dipping down?”

“Not quite as powerful, but the same idea, yeah.”

“But that’s so hard to do!”

“Welcome to the world of magic. Like any craft, it requires endless hours of work and frustration.”

“But, Marco, you can do it?” Star said, smiling wide. Marco felt himself blush a little.

“I- uh-”

“Not well, but yeah.”

“Show me!” Star said, almost bouncing up and down in excitement.

Oh boy was she going to be let down.

“Okay.” Marco held his palm out and closed his eyes to concentrate. He focused his body heat to his hand, and forced it to gather there. He felt every part of his body grow cold apart from his hand, and then a small fire grew in the space above his palm.

The fire licked the air a few times and then sputtered out. Marco shivered and rubbed his warm hand against his leg.

Kar grabbed a blanket and threw it over their shoulders.

“You just made fire!” Star said, way more amazed than someone who could summon an inferno with a wave of her wrist ought to be.

“Y-yeah,” Marco said, still a little cold. “It’s just a little survival tool I learned along the way. I can usually only use it to light a campfire for the night, or to stay cool in the dessert, but it’s pretty useful.”

“It saps all the heat from your body to make the fire,” Kar explained.

“Oh. Cool!”

“I only really know smaller spells like this. I didn’t really get time to master any of it. A real wizard could sap the heat from the air or another person entirely to make a huge-ass fireball.” Marco said.

These entry-level spells always took a lot out of him. In a similar manner, the tracking spell he used to find Fluffy the Cat used up a most of his stamina. He would’ve become proficient at the stuff with more dedication, but time was a factor to consider.

That’s why the Rituals, while coming with much shittier downsides, ended up being Marco’s go-to method of magic. They ran on the logic of equivalent exchange, you give up a part of your body or allow something awful to happen to you in exchange for some easy and accessible magic. The Rituals were the ultimate cheat-sheet to power, assuming you were willing to pay the price.

But now that they were back on Earth, Marco didn’t need the rituals. He could take all the time he needed to learn the basics, and eventually be competent enough at it to teach the people around him.

“It’s still amazing though! Even if you’re not a pro, you can do some magic without a wand or some big book!” Star said before turning to Kar. “What about you, Kar? Did you learn any cool magic on your quest?”

“I never had a need for that stuff,” Kar said. “I had my own system for doing things. A system that mostly involved hurling my face through people’s torsos until the threat was neutralized. Besides, most magic requires hands.”

“I guess I’ll work on that when I make your body, then!” Star said, with a wink.

Kar smiled. “Hear that Marco? I’m gonna get hands. Think of all the obscene gestures I could do!”

“Cool. I get to help my dimension get closer to something resembling a utopia and you get to flip people off.”

“I think that sums up our individual goals pretty well.”

“And I get to help,” Star said, chiming in.

Everyone laughed a little.

“You know what guys, I’m usually a pessimist when it comes to Marco's plan, but I actually think this might work!”

“I think it’s a solid plan, Marco. We have the supplies. We just have to get everyone else on board,” Rula said, being intentionally vague so none of the other people in the street would catch on.

“Yeah, it just might work,” Marco said with a smile. Rula took a sip from her canteen, staying by Marco’s side as they walked through the slums.

No one would recognize him on this side of Mirria, but he still felt like he should be inside. They’d both decided to go out though, despite the risks, and get some fresh air- or, at least, the closest thing the Eastern Mirria Slums had to fresh air.

They were headed to the highest point by the warehouse district, a place where you could see most of the city, just to talk.

“I think he would be proud of us right now,” Rula said, breaking the silence between them. “I miss him.”

Marco frowned and looked up to the sky. “I do too,” he said, and then immediately felt like it was out of place. “I’m sorry.”

“Marco,” Rula said, placing a hand on his shoulder.

Dozens of birds zoomed through the sky, all headed in the same direction.

“Marco,” Rula said again, trying to catch his attention. “You don’t have to blame-“

“Something’s wrong,” Marco said, at the same time the thought crossed his mind. The birds cleared the sky completely, having fled from the center of town.

“Think it's an Enforcer?” Rula said, tensing up.

“No,” Marco said. He turned around and saw a bright light in the distance, its shine carrying over the tops of the houses and buildings. It was getting brighter and possibly closer.

“What the fuck is that?” Rula asked, and running off pure instinct, Marco quickly put his hands together and spit an incantation out as fast as he could.

As the ritual activated, Marco grabbed Rula’s hand and let the barrier wash over them. Whatever was coming, it couldn't see, hear, or touch them, so long as she held his hand.

And then the tidal wave of light swept through the streets, and soon it encompassed Marco’s entire field of vision. All he could see was blinding white light.

And once the light had passed through them, they were surrounded by dust and smoke.

“Oh my god, what’s going on?” Rula asked, squeezing Marco’s hand.

“Is it Elesh?” Marco suggested. Was this the Reckoning?

The dust settled and Marco and Rula gazed upon the entirety of Mirria, flattened to rubble as far as the eye could see. Rula pulled her hand away and covered her mouth. Marco felt like throwing up.

There was nothing left. No people, no buildings. Not even the churches or the court. In a matter of seconds what was once a bustling town became an empty wasteland of dirt and stone.

Marco turned around to watch the wall of light go ever further away from them, leaving endless amounts of debris as it went. It was destroying everything.

There weren’t even screams. By the time people realized what was going on, they were already dead.

Was this what they wanted all along? Not power or control, but pure annihilation?

“Marco?” Rula said, giving him a thousand-yard stare of confusion. Marco realized that letting go of his hand had ended the Ritual’s effect on her. A spell she wasn’t aware of to begin with.

As Marco was about to release the aura around him, a terrifying screech resounded from the center of Mirria, and Marco whipped around to see a giant serpent rise from the ashes of the church.

“It’s Galdos,” Marco said in realization. The serpent turned its head and looked at Marco and Rula.

Then, Rula screamed and disintegrated in a blast of light.

“Rula!” Marco yelled, pointlessly and uselessly. The serpent, apparently not immune to the barrier ritual, turned and floated away, sending blasts of white light to the ground as it flew and demolishing whatever still remained after its initial attack.

The serpent flew until it was completely out of sight, and then Marco was left alone in an infinite wasteland.

He slowly processed everything that had just happened. Rula was dead. Everyone was dead. The Elesh Court had succeeded, or maybe failed.

They never even got a chance to fight back. Toza and H-Poo would not be avenged. It was over before they could even try.

Wind whistled through the air and Marco looked around himself, hoping to see some semblance of life.

Everything was dead.

Marco looked down at his hands. Was there anything he could do? He wracked his brain for some sort of magic or ritual-

Oh. The Rewind Ritual. The last thing Marco had learned from that accursed journal before he tossed it into a raging inferno.

It was a risk. It was the biggest risk he could imagine, but he couldn’t not-

Marco took in a shaky breath. This was the only option. He couldn’t leave it this way. Not like this. If he didn’t do this, the entire world would be done for.

Marco closed his eyes and put his hands into the correct formation. Then, he started the chant, the image of that accursed journal page etched into his mind.

For just a moment, he thought that he said it wrong, and then he felt his body start to burn away.

No no no no!

Before he could try to stop it, he was nothing but dust.

...

“So while the parade plays out at noon, we sneak into the-“

Marco coughed up blood onto the table, all over the resistance’s plans. It felt like a hammer slammed into his skull and he doubled over. Everyone else stood up from their seats.

“What the? Marco, are you okay?” said Trumm.

“What the fuck is going on?” Kar asked.

Marco grasped his chest in pain. Wait. What? Where was he again?

Marco opened his eyes and promptly turned and emptied his stomach onto the ground. He vaguely heard voices around him, but they weren’t important.

He was there again. And he’d be there again and again and again and-

He tried to sit up, but his arm was shaking too hard. He wiped the blood from his mouth and grabbed his knee in an attempt to stabilize himself.

Everyone died. Every time everyone died. He tried to explain it to them, but he always had to get past the hurdle of disbelief. It wasted too much time. He should’ve just gone by himself-

Something pulled him up to a sitting position, and he leaned forward to try to stay up.

If he had just known- if he had acted a day before-

Something started rubbing his back.

He was stupid and reckless and-

“It’s okay,” a voice said. “You aren’t there anymore.”

He had caused so many deaths-

“You’re sitting on your bedroom floor. You’re home. You’re not in danger.”

Marco let in a shaky breath. Had he been hyperventilating?

“You did good things. You did nothing wrong.”

Marco focused on the hand making circles on his back and tried to calm his breathing. Distantly, he thought he heard a second voice on the other side of him, but he couldn’t quite make out what it said.

“Take deep breaths. You are on Earth. You are a champion of a great quest. You’ve done great things, and people love you for it.”

Marco took a deep breath and held it in.

“Now, exhale. Let it out nice and slow.”

Marco let the air out as slowly as possible. He could still feel his heartbeat in his throat.

“Good. Now inhale again.”

She was still rubbing his back slowly.

“And exhale.”

He followed her instructions and began to process the world around him.

It was just a flashback. For a minute he thought he was there again. He looked down at his hand, with a smear of vomit on it. Oh. No blood.

Right, because he hadn’t actually lost anything this time. He had all of his organs actually, instead of seemingly just the ones he needed to survive.

Marco took a slow deep breath as a gloved hand gave him a handkerchief, presumably to wipe the vomit off his hand and mouth. Right, there were other people in the room with him.

People that he threw up and had an attack in front of. Great.

He took the cloth and wiped it slowly across his mouth, not looking up at the people around him. His hand was still shaking. He still needed a minute.

He knew this would happen eventually. There were lots of moments in his life that were average, easy moments to relive. But, even though it wasn’t as often, there were the moments like this, the horrifying, traumatic times where he watched everything he loved die over and over again and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

He was such a fucking hypocrite, complaining about how weak or pathetic he had become because he turned into a kid, as if he was any more capable of saving anyone as an adult. Now the outside just matched the inside.

On his quest, he fucked up so many times he could probably break a record. It was stupid of him to even remotely compare any of it to failing a fucking quiz at school. He was so petty.

“Are you feeling any better, Kar?” It was Star’s voice. That’s right, before the flashback they were talking about… something?

As Marco’s vision became clearer, he soon realized that it wasn’t Star that had been trying to comfort him. The gloved hand that had been rubbing his back belonged to Moon, the very same person that, just a few hours ago, Marco would have assumed was a stuck up bitch. The same person he lashed out at and accused of being a terrible mother and ruler was now the only thing keeping him from screaming his brains out.

“Better?” Moon asked softly, still rubbing his back.

“Yeah,” Marco said, his voice rasping a little.

Moon slowly removed her hand from Marco’s back and gave him some room. Marco looked over on his other side, where Kar was wrapped around Star and she was rubbing his side.

“As he relaxes, give him some space to breathe,” Moon told Star, who looked up at her and nodded.

“You’re, um, good at that,” Marco said. That was the fastest he’d ever calmed down.

Moon seemed genuinely surprised at that. “Oh. You’ll have to thank River for that. I just copied what he usually does.”

Marco chuckled, River was the last person he’d expect to be an expert at calming down broken people. Then he was hit with a realization he should’ve had sooner.

Oh. He really did misjudge her.

Beside him, Kar started moving on his own.

‘You doing okay?’

‘We’ll talk about it later.'

“Thank you guys,” Marco said, smiling up at Moon and Star.

“Yeah. Thanks,” Kar said to Star, his voice also a little raspy.

“It was all Mom, actually. I was just following her instructions,” Star said.

Marco looked around the room. It was just him, Kar, Moon, and Star. His parents and River weren’t there, which meant Moon was good enough to not cause a ruckus and alert the rest of the house. But that left a big question hanging in his head.

“Why are you here?” Marco asked Moon, and then backtracked. “I mean, not that I’m ungrateful, but how did you know to come in and help?”

“Mom was spying on us,” Star said, shooting a sharp look at Moon.

“I-I wouldn’t call it spying. I was merely…” Moon paused to think of a synonym that was less incriminating. “...Um, eavesdropping?”

“You were spying on us like a teenage girl spies on the guy she likes,” Star said, with an edge of bitterness. “Grow up, Mom.”

Marco suddenly realized what Moon must had been eavesdropping on.

‘Oh shit. Looks like we got busted before we even did anything.’ Kar thought.

Moon’s expression intensified. “And, pray tell, Star, what would’ve happened if I didn’t spy on you two? You would’ve involved yourself in something extremely dangerous without considering the consequences. If you were caught disregarding High Commission Law like this, did you think your position as future queen would be enough to protect you?”

Star didn’t even blink at her mother. “Extremely dangerous? What? You mean like a bunch of monsters attacking me on a daily basis, trying to steal my stuff?”

Moon flinched slightly, but her posture stayed determined. “That’s not what we’re discussing right now.”

“Oh really? What’s this discussion about, then?” Star said. “Your whole point was danger, but you never have any problems throwing me in danger if you think it’ll teach me something!”

This was escalating. Marco needed to bring everyone back to the topic at hand. “Don’t blame Star for this, Moon. It was my stupid idea to begin with. I just roped her into it.” He didn’t like resorting to this, but if putting his ambitions on hold for the foreseeable future would help Moon calm down, it was worth it.

Moon disregarded his comment entirely. “I wasn’t trying to teach you a lesson, Star. I sent you to Earth so you’d have a safe place to hone your magic”

“I have the wand, Mom! There isn’t a single place in the universe where I’d be safe.” She then presented her wand, making damn sure Moon saw it. “I’ve had a target over my head since I was a baby!”

“But people on Earth don’t know about magic, so they wouldn’t be after the wand,” Moon explained, as if Star was a naive child. “Which is why we shouldn’t teach them magic in the first place.” She gave Marco a sharp glance.

“Actually, bringing me to Earth just put the Diaz’s in danger! Because they don’t know magic!” Star pointed at Marco. “Marco got kidnapped by Toffee and almost killed!”

Moon winced at the name Toffee.

“As long as there are scissors roaming around,” Star continued, “anyone can come to Earth! Heckapoo, a member of the High Commission, even came to Earth herself and kidnapped Marco!”

“Is everything alright in here?” River said from the doorway, where Marco’s parents were also standing.

Great, more complications. So far, Operation: Bring Magic to Earth was going off without a hitch.