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Axton Manor, June 2007. Eight years before the end of everything.

Somewhere in the past, a nineteen year old Zephyr walks an eighteen year old Kamala through the archway in the trophy room and into the sprawling conservatory. As he walks her down the flower lined aisles, soft, silvery moonlight illuminates the green garden in shades of black and gray. Kamala enjoys the way sweet, artificial tropic air kisses her face as Zephyr leads her by gripping her hand in his, his calloused palms scratching hers.

"Is this what you woke me up in the middle of the night for, to show me some flowers by the pool?" Kamala asks, brushing her other hand over the plants as they cross a small bridge toward a sturdy oak tree at the center of the conservatory, "or is your mind fixated on deflowering?"

"Be careful, those are delicate," Zephyr says, his face growing warm as he tries to ignore what she said.

Kamala laughs to herself and instead runs her hands through Zephyr's bright crimson hair.

"I like your hair better this way, it's a lovely color."

"Do you think so? I like it too; it keeps me from looking like him. Dad seems to hate it though; he says I have to cut it," Zephyr says over the rush of an artificial waterfall that mists the fur on their faces.

"Don't you find that strange?" Kamala asks as they stop by the edge of an artificial pond before the tree.

"He's our father, Kamala. He can tell us what to do, even if some of us think we've outgrown him."

"But to tell us when and how to cut our own hair or tell us what to wear is going too far, and please stop calling him our father, I don't think of you as my brother."

"Is Indigo still torn up about that?" Zephyr asks, thinking about his youngest sibling.

"They're not taking it well. Dad can't control who he, I mean they are. Indigo's always been different, and Dad can't change who they are inside, even if they wanted to, and it doesn't matter, I love them for who they are."

Zephyr nods, trying to find a way to steer past the awkward conversation. He supports Indigo, but he knows he can't stand up against Thaddeus, no matter how much he wants to.

"I wanted to show you this," Zephyr says, crouching down and reaching into the warm saccharine waters of the pond to caress a waterlily in his hand.

"They're beautiful," Kamala says, admiring the petals of the pink flower.

"They're hybrids, I made them for you. It took me a while, but I wanted something that looked just like you. They're lotus flowers, see how they go from pink to white the same way your hair does? I wanted to make these special, for you."

"What makes them special?" Kamala asks curiously, kneeling beside him.

Zephyr cups his hands around the flower. In the darkness of his hands, the lotus radiates a bright pink glow.

Kamala stares in astonishment until an aching feeling bursts from somewhere deep within her, causing her to burst into bright pink tears.

"Kamala, what's wrong?" Zephyr says, putting a wet hand on her shoulder.

"They were so beautiful the way they were. Why did you have to change them? There was nothing wrong with the way they looked before, why does everything have to be special for anyone to notice?"

"Where's this coming from? I thought you liked them," Zephyr says, confused.

Kamala wipes her eyes in her sleeves as she glances up toward the great glass dome of the conservatory.

"I do, but I just wonder sometimes if anyone would even notice me if I were average, or if they only like me because I'm special, or because I'm part of The Zenith."

"I think you're beautiful," Zephyr admits.

"What?" Kamala asks, flustered at the suddenness of his confession. The two glare at one another before the wide trunk of the tree, finally free as the truth spills forward one confession at a time.

"I mean, I like you for who you are, exactly the way you are." Zephyr says, nervously grasping her warm hands.

"I like you just the way you are too," Kamala says, meeting the wolf's gaze. She's known Zephyr all her life, but it's this moment, under the cover of the conservatory that sums eighteen years of confusing emotions in her heart. Everything about this moment, from the sticky air, to the fluttering in her heart, tells her this is the right moment to abandon who she once was and embrace who she wants to be.

Alone and under the cover of a full moon, Kamala finally kisses Zephyr. When her lips push against his, she's surprised he doesn't pull away. He places his arms just above her swaying tail, his own tail beating against a plant like the gusts of a hurricane as it wags from elation.

They surrender to their emotions, allowing everything to slip away, including every bit of identity forced onto them, until only their passion for each other remains.

***

Axton Manor, June 2015. One month before the end of everything.

Nearly a decade has passed since that liberating day in the conservatory, where Kamala gained and lost so much amongst the flowers. Presently, she finds herself inside the same conservatory, staring up at the same sturdy oak tree they saw the sun rise from as they faced toward the manor, their naked bodies intertwined as they spoke through the night. But now, instead of looking into a pair of vulnerable red eyes, she kneels beside an empty pond at the center of the glass canopy, tilling the soil beside her with her claws and trying her best to understand the process that gave Zephyr so much joy and peace, as Kamala struggles to find her own peace now that she's back in the manor.

Quinn is adjusting well to her new home. She particularly enjoys the serene landscape; she's never lived in the silence beyond the cities.

Kamala has largely kept to herself, periodically spending time with Phoenix in the manor's gym, or joining Kyran for a morning run or evening swim in the conservatory. The manor's always made her uncomfortable, as if the energy emanating from it is opposite to hers. She only sees the manor as a temporary home, as she longs for elsewhere.

Being back in Thaddeus's manor doesn't make Kamala feel like she belongs, all she can think about is going back to London, to the pubs Quinn promised she'd take her to, to the stadiums she swears she'll play in. She can't help but to feel guilty that she's stolen so much from her.

She's trapped repenting for the sins of her mother.

But as the days tick down to July, they're no closer to a plan than they were a month ago, a fact that's building frustration inside of everyone.

That same evening, Kamala meets Kyran in the massive library as he discusses possible plans with Aarden, who hastily scribbles in his small green notebook.

"Just who I wanted to see," Kyran says, setting his golden glasses down and moving aside on the sofa.

"Kyran, we still need a plan. We need to come up with something fast," Kamala says, blue and red light shining on half her face from the stained glass walls.

Kyran rubs his aching eyes before slipping his glasses back onto look at his twin sister.

"Were trying, Kamala. All we know so far is that we have to find a way to weaken Zephyr enough for Indigo to get a hold of him, that's all we know. How we do that exactly is the problem."

"I thought Indigo said we could knock him out," Kamala says.

"From their experience, it appears certain synthetic chemical compounds can wane Zenith Crown energy enough to cause a temporary lapse in our adaptation. But we don't know for certain what would work, and how much to use, unless we found a way to drag him back here and restrain him. Ziegler won't allow that, so we need to find a way to make it happen quickly."

"We can put together a mixture of things and try it, all we have to do is get close enough," Kamala suggests.

Kyran shakes his head as he visualizes the plan in his aching head.

"We're talking about sedating Zephyr in his four-hundred-pound werewolf form. There's no way to tell how he'll react. We could end up stopping his heart if we use too much of the right stuff, or with just a little of the wrong stuff. We're not sure what the effects of any of these drugs could be and no matter how much Phoenix insists he try; I won't put any of you at risk," Kyran says.

"Well, if we can't sedate him, what else can we do?"

"Ziegler controls him," Aarden says, flipping through the pages of his notebook.

"Based on what you said happened in the lab, and what Indigo says they saw at the nightclub, Zephyr was controlled by something, a trigger of some sort. His senses are heightened when he's a werewolf. Maybe it's a sound too subtle for us to detect. If we can find the source of that, we can potentially control him for long enough to turn him," Aarden says.

"There's no evidence a sensory trigger exists," Kyran says, "we can't risk another trip to look for something that may not even be there. We have one shot at this."

"Well, we have to think of something," Kamala says, her voice rising.

"What do you think we're doing now?" Kyran says angrily, tossing a book onto the glass table in frustration.

A slam of doors and a cloud of black smoke later, and Aarden finds himself alone in the massive library.

"I better not be inhaling you when you do the ninja smoke-cloud thing!" Aarden yells, knowing Kyran is in the annex on the other side of the wall.

Aarden sets his journal aside and lays on the couch, glaring up at the flower-like crystal chandelier until he thinks himself into a dream.

***

Some time later, Kamala marches up the stairs, so blinded with fury she makes a wrong turn to peer down a long hallway from distant childhood memories. The hall, containing five identical bedrooms identified by large brass numbers, was the only place in the manor the Zenith were free of their training and responsibilities.

Kamala turns the handle and opens the door to room number three, peering inside her childhood bedroom for the first time since she moved all of her things to the manor's art gallery.

A narrow bedroom with slanted walls on the upper floor of the manor, the abandoned space melts into focus as her eyes adjust to the dusty darkness.

Guided by memory, she flips the switch to bathe a space frozen in time with the dull golden glow of a singular lamp. Stepping up to a dresser drawer, Kamala brushes aside the thick layer of dust that settles upon the jewel cases leaning against her first boombox. As she makes her way to the wide window at the end of the room, she pushes slumped posters back against the wall, facing first crushes and first loves for the first time again as she glances at posters of both boy bands and the Zenith themselves.

The pink panther sits on the ledge, opening the windows and allowing a summer breeze to push apart the light blue curtains. Loose sheets of faded lined paper catch the breeze and take flight as she peers to her left past Kyran's bedroom to Zephyr's, remembering when he would open his window on summer nights identical to tonight to talk to her when he found himself too deep in thought to sleep, or when he wanted to see her smile before bed.

She misses him more than anything, and knowing he's out there somehow makes it all worse.

Kamala enters Zephyr's bedroom, surprised it still smells like him. Dried mud crunches at her feet as she looks around, the room exactly the way Zephyr left it on the same day they went to rescue Aarden.

Of all of them, Zephyr was the only one who never moved out of his small childhood bedroom, choosing to find comfort in a bed too small for him, instead of chasing his ambitions of living in the great outdoors. He forced himself to set aside his own dreams for the good of the team and help Thaddeus in any way he could, and all it did was trap him within a beast.

In the years since she sat on her ledge and finally told Zephyr how she truly felt about him, it's dawned on Kamala that the decisions in their lives were always an illusion, and the path set in motion for them can't be stopped. Everything is leading to a violent clash with Ziegler at the end of everything.

Her ultimate fear now isn't that Zephyr won't be around to fight alongside them, it's that Zephyr will ultimately be the one they need to fight.

Warm tears roll off the velvety fur on Kamala's face as she gently holds one of the empty terracotta planters Zephyr kept at his windowsill, each plant having long withered away when their caretaker never made it back home from his final mission.

Kamala spends the remainder of a painfully lonely night in Zephyr's room. When the sun finally rises to greet her tired face, bathing the room in the golden glow of a new uncertain day, she can't remember at all if she slept that night, having spent most of the night staring into the ceiling through tears, trying to pull memories of a time that's fading away.

***

San Francisco, July 2015. Three weeks before the end of everything.

Quinn repeats herself to Aarden, her questions echoing between the gears in his spinning head until the red panda darts up from deep within journal pages he's trying to burn into his memory.

"I'm sorry, what did you say?" Aarden asks as their bus makes a hard turn, pushing Quinn against him on the narrow seat, filling his nose with her flowery perfume.

"You weren't listening to a word I was saying, were you?" Quinn asks, the dark eyeliner around her eyes causing her glare to burn even more intensely than usual.

"I'm sorry, Quinn. I have too much going on in my head right now to focus on anything else but the time slipping away from us. It was nice of you to invite me to come out here and spend some time together, but we have an immovable deadline and no plan whatsoever, and it doesn't help that I can't get those four in one room together without some sort of argument starting. So, it's somehow up to me to coordinate information between personalities like Kyran who asks too many questions I don't have the answer to, and Phoenix who falls asleep whenever I talk to him."

"I understand, but you can't let this take control over you the way it has," Quinn says, peering past Aarden at the bay glimmering like sea glass in the distance.

"What else am I supposed to do?"

"Live your life, Aarden."

"What life? We're dealing with a serious situation here, and we're supposed to take care of things like this, it's what we do."

"What, heroes?" Quinn asks, rolling her eyes.

"No, friends. Zephyr would do the same for us."

"How do you know that, if you've never met him."

Aarden slams his notebook shut and stuffs it into the pocket of his green jacket. He stares out at the bay, the rusty fur at the edge of his face glimmering in the sunlight.

"He's trapped and suffering that way because of me, and I'm going to do everything I can to come up with a plan to bring him back, and I have less than three weeks to figure it out!"

Quinn reaches over Aarden and pulls the cord to signal their stop. She ushers Aarden off the bus and into an unusually sunny day on San Francisco's crowded pier.

"It shouldn't have to fall on you alone. All I want you to do is spend some time away from that, with me. I've been so bored in that big bloody house all day. Just one day won't hurt. Do it for me."

"Just one day?" Aarden asks, the salty scent of the estuary flowing into his nose along the cool marina breeze as he squints past the sunlight to look at Quinn's face, realizing only now how much her fur gleams like purple wildflowers after the summer monsoon.

"Just one day," Quinn reassures him, catching her lacy skirt as the breeze tries to lift it.

"Where do we even go? I'm not too familiar with San Francisco," Aarden says, afraid to admit he's rarely left the manor in the last several years. He's lived a sheltered life, and between a small cabin within the ponderosa pines of Arizona and a luxuriant manor in the California redwoods, he hasn't had much time to interact with anyone like Quinn, it's all so new to him.

"We'll just ask around."

Quinn grabs the sleeves of Aarden's jacket and leads him into the spectacular unknown, wanting nothing more than to explore the world with someone who, like her, is seeing it all for the first time.

***

Later that same evening, under the radiant orange of a late summer sunset, Aarden and Quinn relax on a tall hill beside a tower overlooking the city, Aarden still feeling nauseous from tasting his first beer twice.

Quinn lays down beside him in a patch of dry grass, amused by the radiant fireworks going off in the orange horizon.

"I've never spent a day like this before," Aarden confesses, observing the insects within the forest of grass.

"Never?" Quinn asks, sitting up and rolling closer to him as the distance between them feels too vast for her liking.

"Never. I didn't attend school and I never had friends as I'm sure you have. Xavier did an amazing job at teaching me so many things, everything I know is thanks to him," Aarden says.

"So you never went out and gotten in trouble like we did tonight?"

Aarden shakes his head, his face growing warm from embarrassment.

"Then I'm glad I can be there for your first time. If it wasn't for your quick thinking, we would've been arrested outside that bar. How did you come up with a story like that?"

"I don't know. My mind's always racing, I probably just heard it somewhere once before," Aarden says, picking grass off his jeans.

Quinn's hand inches closer to his as they watch the summer dissolve to twilight.

"Isn't this all going too fast?" Aarden asks as dazzling green fireworks burst in the teal sky above their heads.

"What do you mean?"

"This. Us."

"What do you think is going to happen once we come back from London? Have you ever given that much thought?" Quinn asks, sitting up, her violet face glowing blue as the sky now bursts into shades of deep red.

"No. I've been too preoccupied with what happens when we get to London, I never stopped to think about what happens after."

"Well, I can't stop thinking about the after. We'll run out of time, that's what'll happen. So why not make the most of the little time we have left if there's nothing either one of us alone can do to stop it."

Aarden darts up, his head spinning, but he feels a pit in his stomach as his racing mind tries to connect lines like he used to when he tracked the constellations in the night sky above his first home.

"Is that why you're doing this? Do you think that I'm going to die?"

Quinn fails to suppress her laughter at his sudden frenzy.

"Yes, Aarden. I can sense death all around you," she says in a morbid tone.

Aarden runs his hands through his light blond hair, his eyes looking into Quinn's as anxiety floods him.

"I'm kidding. I can't tell the future Aarden. I'm doing this because I like you and I want to spend time doing thoughtless things with you before everything changes and I have to live a dreary life again," Quinn says, holding his hand tightly. From the moment she met him, Aarden has kept the pain of losing Singh away.

"Whatever happens after, I'll come looking for you," Aarden assures her, his anxiety melting away through her touch. From the moment he met her, Quinn has kept the pain of losing Xavier away.

They try to see their futures in the stars for minutes that feel like hours before Quinn speaks.

"Do you have time to do one last crazy thing?" She asks, a mischievous look on her face.

"I feel like I have enough time for a million crazy things when I'm around you."

Later that same night, Aarden looks at his reflection in the mirror of Quinn's bathroom as she paints a Kelly-green streak into his light blond hair. Quinn bites her tongue as she brushes more cold dye onto his head from root to tip.

"There, now you'll have something to remember me by, and you'll look just like the others."

"What was school like?" Aarden asks, seeing her expression change in the mirror.

"School? It's different for everyone, but it was fine for the most part. Parts of it were tough for me. It's not easy hiding who you are deep inside, no matter how far back into your mask you try to hide. I still cherish some of those memories, especially from when I felt normal."

"Tell me everything about it, and about growing up around others the same age as you."

"Sure thing, Aarden," she says, her expression changing again.

She answers every one of Aarden's questions, and just one day turns into the next day as the first rays of dawn spill into the room, the two still deep in conversation as laughter occupies the small bedroom in a large and empty manor.

Aarden sits against the gilded wall, Quinn leaning on his shoulder as they search for sleep that never comes. Maybe everything will change after London, but they will always have this day to look back on when they feel as lost as they did when they were strangers to one another.

***

Axton Manor, later that morning.

Phoenix rolls out of his massive bed, unable to sleep as his body grows too warm for sheets or clothes under the glass ceiling of the solarium. The freezing water in the shower bursts into clouds of steam when it meets fur on a muscular body burning like hot coals. Across Phoenix's broad chest, a smooth, wide scar from a confrontation he'd rather forget breaks the yellow and cream fur like a fault line. All the lovers who've spent a night under the stars in Phoenix's bed have seen the scar, but none have been close enough to him to ask where it came from.

The lion hastily throws on anything he can find off the floor before taking the elevator to meet Kamala below ground in the manor's gymnasium. The panther is already busy lifting heavy weights, grunting as she struggles to lift heavier, trying to push her body to its limits.

"Glad to see you're still keeping up," Phoenix says as he idly lifts weights beside her.

"Can't say the same about you. You getting some belly there?" Kamala asks through a strained grin.

Phoenix shakes his head, grunting as he lifts heavier.

"Maybe Indigo will notice if I put on the dad bod, they seem to be into that."

Later, as Phoenix looks through missed and mixed messages on his cellphone, Kamala approaches him, pulling something from the pocket of her jacket.

"I'm sorry about your ring," she says as she places Thaddeus's heavy gold ring on his lap.

"I'm good at melting things down. Turns out I'm not so good at putting them back together, but I gave it my best shot," Kamala says, her voice fading to a soft murmur as her ears dart backward.

"The ring isn't mine; Quinn stole it off Kyran," Phoenix reminds her, holding the glass door open as they walk down the hall to the elevator leading to the foyer.

"Right. Well, if you could give it back to him along with my apologies, I'd appreciate it. I couldn't save most of what was etched inside it, I hope it wasn't important."

"I'm sure he doesn't mind," Phoenix says, immediately forgetting about the ring when he places it in the pocket of his sweatpants.

Kamala runs into Quinn on their way up the grand staircase to their bedrooms, catching her as she nearly trips over the tall steps of the stairs.

"Sorry, I didn't sleep at all last night," she explains to the panther, who laughs as the green dye on her hands pulls a memory of their time in Paris. They continue to climb the stairs until their voices fade away altogether in the halls above.

Phoenix is close to a decision on what to do with his day when Indigo's shouting travels down the long hallway.

When he finds the rabbit, they're hugging a tear-soaked pillow in a sitting room, staring into the ugly wallpaper until their beautiful eyes are too teary to see it anymore.

"Everything okay, cottontail?" Phoenix asks, the long orange sofa creaking as he sits on the opposite end of it.

Indigo wipes their eyes in soft pink sleeves, leaving streaks of black eyeliner on them as they lean against him, kicking their heels off and staring up at him as they lay their soft head on his warm lap.

"Orson wants me to come back. I told him I can't, but he says he's got a bad feeling about all of this. Where does he get off telling me he's got a bad feeling when I can practically read his insecurity over the phone? He just wants me close to keep an eye on me. I told him it would take a month; he says we should reconsider our relationship. What am I supposed to do, sunflower?"

"This isn't going to surprise you, but I don't know. I've never moved past the one-night stand phase myself," Phoenix says, running his hands through the long wavy sea of blue silk on Indigo's head.

"Maybe he just misses you," Phoenix suggests.

"Since when am I someone who's ever going to be missed?" Indigo teases.

"I missed you," Phoenix says, oblivious to Indigo's sarcasm.

"I missed you too," Indigo says, sitting up.

The air seems to grow unusually thick between them, as Indigo moves to the opposite end of the couch, kicking up dust by drumming their fingers on the furniture of a room they remember too well.

"You know," Indigo says, "this room has the best view of the driveway, it's looking right at it, given you sit at this angle toward the window. I used to keep the light on and sit here late into the night, so you'd know I was here waiting for you when you decided to come back home. I did that every night I could for a few years, until I was convinced you were never coming back. That was the last time I was in this room."

Phoenix glances out at the cobblestone driveway, remembering how sore his legs felt the day he had to hike all the way up to the manor from the town at the base of the hill.

"I don't think I've ever been in here. Listen Indigo, about that time. I wanted to come back home more than anything, I understood that almost immediately after I left. But the same reason I didn't come back was the same thing that kept you from coming back, look for that inside you and I bet it's the same reason Kamala didn't either. It's the fact that there's so much more out there for us than this. I never wanted any of this."

"I never wanted any of this either Phoenix. I just wanted you," Indigo admits, sitting up.

Indigo's hands are wrapped around the crystal doorknob when a yearning rises from deep inside their heart. They contemplate, choosing instead to walk away from Phoenix and the pain that will come from a mistimed confession of their love for him.

A flustered Phoenix takes a catnap on the sofa after hours of deliberation, sleeping until he's awakened hours later by a dull pressure on his side. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a golden ring.

He's close to putting it away and forgetting about it again when he reads the first letters of a familiar name etched into the gold.

He pieces her name together in an instant, having stared into her eyes every day in a photograph he keeps in his wallet.

Xochitl.

***

Mexico, August 1990. Twenty-five years before the end of everything.

Thaddeus Axton sits on the glistening white sands of an unfamiliar beach. Warm waves of salty sea-foam caress his bare feet as he tries to focus on the tribulations lying beyond the serenity of a resort town carved from untamable jungle.

Long after the last tourist leaves fading footprints on the sand, a nurse guides him through the salt air and into a small infirmary overlooking a serene Pacific Ocean. But lightning looms in the distance, casting light onto the dark horizon.

Xochitl Solis smiles as much as she can, clutching a small lion who pushes against the heavy blankets wrapped around him. A stunning lioness with docile, olive-colored eyes, she smiles through her preoccupation at him, trying her best to reassure him.

Thaddeus kisses the top of her head and stares into the eyes of his heir, holding him high until a nurse's tepid voice asks for him to deliver his son into her trembling arms.

"He has a fever, the doctors won't tell me how high, and they won't let me hold him without the blankets, Thaddeus. They know something is wrong. I heard them say they were contacting the University," Xochitl tells Thaddeus in a heavy accent, pulling him close so they're not overheard.

"Nothing will happen to him. I can fly you both to London and have you under the care of my doctors by morning. You wanted him to be born here, and now that he's here with us, there's no reason to stay."

"We've raised suspicion, Thaddeus. They won't let us leave," Xochitl says.

"Since when have we ever asked for permission?"

Minutes later, when local police break apart the lock to the metal doors for a group of local scientists, they find the only bed in the small maternity ward long abandoned, with only rumors remaining of a well-dressed albino peacock boarding a private flight to London, a large bundle of blankets in her arms.

***

Axton Manor, July 2015.

If I can compel myself to speak a truth so agonizing it haunts my every waking day, I'd say she was everything I ever desired, and a life alone with her on those burning Mexican beaches would've gifted me the everlasting joy I've sought all my life. But that's what terrified me about her most of all. She was the closest I've ever come to deserting the destiny sang to me in that freezing tundra all those years ago. Love guides us over boundaries we're too afraid to leap across, and Xochitl Solis was going to guide me toward happiness, but happiness at the cost of The Zenith Crown was an impossible price to pay. This purpose is greater than any love or loss. Eventually, she gifted me the relief of not making the choice myself by abandoning me before I could ever convince myself I could live without her. I often stay up at night, unable to sleep under the immense weight of my failures. By far, my largest failure is in Phoenix, who chose to run away rather than rise to be the heir to my legacy. I understand now that Zephyr is the one who will lead us to our moment. If not him, no one else will, and all my hope will be lost, and all my loss will have been hopeless. Phoenix may be my son, but he's like her in every way. He holds the same fiery potential, but he's too afraid--

Thaddeus's words burn to ash in Phoenix's fingertips as he tears through his father's journals late into the same night he spoke to Indigo, his veins drowned with drink and his eyes teeming with tears. Phoenix tears more pages, feeding the roaring fire in Thaddeus's elusive study.

It's been hours since Phoenix read any of the words, instead burning any page stained with ink, trying his hardest to erase anything Thaddeus left behind. Phoenix was mistaken to believe every page burned would lift a weight off his heart, but the weight of the ashes weighs heavier on his conscience.

From dissipating black smoke, amber eyes glare with fire, aghast at the sight before him.

"Phoenix, what are you doing!?" Kyran demands, sifting through the torn pages on the floor and peering into the blazing fire fueled by words he'll never read.

"You never told me," Phoenix says, taking the ring off his finger and tossing it at Kyran, who catches it.

"I told you it was Dad's, what else is there to know about it?"

"It was his engagement ring. Inside the ring was the name Xochitl Solis. She was my mother," Phoenix says, showing him the corner of a warped polaroid, inadvertently branded by Phoenix's anger, the image unsalvageable.

"And me not knowing that somehow justifies you destroying everything he left behind?" Kyran asks, picking papers off the floor.

"He never told me about her, he kept everything from us," Phoenix says, burning more pages in his hands quicker than Kyran can burn into his memory.

"Stop that!" Kyran demands.

"Why?"

"Because there's so much more to learn, and I can't do that If you destroy everything that's left of him!"

Phoenix tosses everything on the desk aside, frightening Kyran.

"I've spent all night reading it! I read it until I was seeing double and all he wrote is about how much he fucking hates us. How much he hates me for being a disappointment and not living up to his expectations, how much he hates you for not being as powerful as Zephyr. How much he hates Kamala for confusing Zephyr, and how much he hates Indigo just for who they are. But there's pages and pages of praise for Zephyr, his greatest achievement. Well, if Zephyr is so great, why can't he just save himself and stop wasting our goddamn time," Phoenix says, throwing the last journal into the fire, causing glowing embers to fill the room.

Kyran teleports in time to reach it but is too slow to prevent his hand from diving right into the heart of the flames. He grasps his singed hand, intense pain running up his arm.

"Look what you did," Kyran gasps through the gaps in his clenched teeth.

Phoenix's head is too dizzy, and his heart is too cold to care about what happens to Kyran.

"Why can't you see how much he hated you Kyran. He did what he did to Zephyr to save him, but he was the only one worth saving in his eyes. To the rest of us, it wasn't to save us or to give us a second chance, It was to destroy us and take us from our families. I went to Mexico to look for her, and I saw her sons playing in the fields. Brothers I'll never know because Thaddeus did this to us out of hate. But in your eyes, he's done nothing wrong, even in the end he played games with us, giving you everything and us nothing. Even dead he's controlling our lives. How far back in time do you want to go Kyran? We might be able to save Zephyr, but never Thaddeus, no matter how much you try to become him."

Kyran tries to remain calm, but the fury is burning him from within.

"You don't know what you're talking about, you never do. You weren't there, how could you know what we went through without you? It was your choice to turn your back on us, no one made you, and things were so much better without you, and now that he's dead you stick around like that's supposed to mean something to me or make up for leaving the first time. Why can't you just turn around and walk away again, this time for good," Kyran tells his brother, pushing his hands on his chest and shoving Phoenix against a bookshelf.

"Fine, I'll go. At least I still have a mother to go back to, since you're too busy trying to save the monster that killed yours," Phoenix says, his eyes searing with hatred and his snout scrunching as he bares his fangs and claws, lunging and attacking any part of Kyran he can until he's punching at smoke.

Kyran reappears, his glasses shattered and blood rushing from his broken nose as he pushes his brother, a lifetime of rage burning inside him and an abhorrent desire to see Phoenix bleed the pain he's held inside for years, overwhelming him.

Phoenix lands a punch at Kyran's side, who sputters in agony as he clutches a shattered rib.

Adrenaline pumps the pain out of Kyran's body as he tackles Phoenix, teleporting them both onto the garden below, the lion landing squarely on his back against a bed of dead flowers.

Phoenix shifts his weight to roll on top of Kyran, pinning him and punching the hard soil as he misses his disappearing face, but Phoenix is familiar with Kyran's attacks, and he catches him when he tries to leap again.

"You should've stayed away," Kyran grunts through gritted teeth.

"And you should've died on that fucking mountain!"

Kyran spits blood onto his face as they trample the flowers.

"You'll never amount to anything, you'll always just be a quitter in my eyes!"

In this moment, all Phoenix wants to do is hurt Kyran with his body the same way he hurt him with his words.

Phoenix buries his claws into Kyran's back, tearing outward through his lean flesh and silken fur before Kyran disappears, leaving a puddle of splattered blood on the base of Zephyr's headstone.

Phoenix reaches at the smoke to attack again when a powerful burst of pink energy strikes him over his heart, incapacitating him for long enough to allow Kyran to teleport him and his twin sister into the library, the velvet sofa absorbing the blood rushing from the deep tiger-stripe like gashes on his back.

"What the hell has gotten into you, were you trying to kill him!?" Kamala shouts at him when she returns to the garden, shaking him with burning hands. Phoenix leans his head against smooth stone, seeing only the green from the bright flash of light as he blinks sight back into his eyes.

Aarden and Quinn push past Fletcher and run into the garden. The sight of Aarden's horrorstruck face rushes panic into Phoenix.

"Where is he?" Phoenix asks, trying to push past Kamala. She generates a barrier of solid crystal to keep him back.

"Phoenix please don't make me hurt you."

"Where is he!?" Phoenix growls, throwing a clenched fist into the solid barrier, shattering it like glass.

"What did the both of you get us involved in?" she asks tearfully, avoiding the sharp shards of crystal.

"I'm sorry," Phoenix says, pushing Kamala aside and running as fast as his aching body allows him, knowing something besides his heart is shattered by the pain he feels when he places weight on his right foot.

Indigo chases Phoenix as fast as their legs can carry them, shouting his name until their voice breaks, but Phoenix doesn't turn around, revving the engine of his motorcycle to life and drowning them in clouds of dust the tires kick back.

Back in the garden, the fury inside Kamala erupts, causing her to channel all her rage at a fictitious memorial to Zephyr, detesting that it reminds her that even if they save him, something still died that day.

The obelisk shatters with the force of the blast, shooting polished marble in every direction, shattering several of the manor's stained glass windows.

Quinn holds onto Aarden's hand, ducking to avoid the rubble flying toward them. She lets go of his hand to run toward Kamala. She leans into the raccoon, sobbing to channel her grief.

But something feels wrong to Kamala; the surrounding energy is resisting her.

A dazzling rainbow of light floods the garden, emanating from the chasm carved from her power, and a deep humming ignites the silent air like electricity.

"He's gone," Indigo says, an unusual sensation building up inside them as their glossy eyes pick up the light and their ears perk from the unusual sound.

"What's that?" the rabbit asks, their senses drawn toward the secret garden Thaddeus buried deep under the memory of his eldest son.

Quinn reaches out to stop Kamala as she approaches the rim of the crater to peer into a light glowing increasingly brighter.

"I feel something. Does anyone else feel that or is it just me?" Indigo asks.

"That buzzing?" Aarden asks through tears, "I can feel it too. It's like anxiety, like something bad is going to happen."

"I know what this is," Kamala says. "Don't ask me how, but I just know. This feeling is familiar, even if I've never felt this way before."

Energy surges away from Kamala's fingertips as she reaches at the radiant collection of teardrop-shaped gemstones, drawn together like the petals of an ominous flower or a crystalline crown.

Like the lotus flower shining in the darkness of Zephyr's closed palms, The Zenith Crown shines in the emptiness of Zephyr's grave, emanating the energy draining the color from Kamala's fur, transforming it to snowy white as her fingertips come closer to the crystalline blossom.