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Smoke fills Ziegler's lungs. He groans, having survived yet another impossibility. Recalling the rubble of London, he roars with pain as his world is filled with rain and fire. He pulls his body through the flooded garden until he's facing Thaddeus Axton in the flooded library.

"You deceived me! What happened to loyalty?" The lion asks frantically as the flames above are doused by the sprinkler system, "you said the concoction would erase their adaptations temporarily, enough to convince them giving up the boy was for the best, to save everyone."

"Since when has anyone you've known been completely loyal to you?" Ziegler asks, splattering the floor with blood when he coughs, "I did what I had to, you agreed to let me take the boy."

"I knew true loyalty once, then everyone became as corrupted as you are now. Why didn't you tell me you could manipulate Zenith 5," Thaddeus says, shocked.

Ziegler howls with pain as he pushes bone back into a socket under torn flesh.

"Corrupt, am I? Well, I remember a time when we shared a common vision. Not long ago, we saw a world on its knees, trembling in fear over the decisions of a handful of dangerously impulsive individuals who had no right to the power they held. The lives of millions were in their hands and no one could provide justification for why that was. We've been forced to surrender our natural ability to defend ourselves from that, and for what? The Zenith give us the chance to restore those defense mechanisms and then take them to a place where even a billion years of evolution couldn't. They're the heirs to the new world we're creating for them. You can't stop it, Thaddeus, it's inevitable. They're inevitable."

Thaddeus rises, the adrenaline keeping his head from spinning as the realization of his mistake dawns on him.

He's betrayed the trust of his children, for something he lost long ago.

"Idealism isn't reality. You can't abandon everything we've built and leave it to chance. Although flawed, our world is systematic, you can't introduce something as unstable as the Zenith Crown into it and expect anything more than complete destruction," Thaddeus warns. Somewhere deep in the manor, more of the sprinklers designed to douse Phoenix's adaptation are triggered.

"So, old friend, do we move forward with my plan, or will you maintain the failing course?"

"I will not let you harm them."

Ziegler grins. "Very well."

Ziegler shatters the decanter onto the floor of the library with equally shattered hands, cutting himself deeply in silenced anguish, blood falling to the floor like rain from his coat of dark storm cloud fur.

"Either way, you've lost, Thaddeus. After all this time, you'd think it would be me who would surrender to pained isolation like a wounded and defenseless animal. But it was you who has grown more distrustful and paranoid with each passing day. The walls caved in on you until you had no one left to trust. I've never forgotten the true value of loyalty. I've also learned that reliance on instinct is worth much more than misguided logic. Even if you command the most powerful beings on the planet, they can't protect you forever, and you can't protect them from the enemies you've made for them."

Ziegler breaks the small, glowing vial hidden inside his tattered jacket, tipping the plasma-like energy onto his open wounds, power surging inside him as it seeps into his bloodstream.

"It was generous of you to allow me to part ways with a section of the Zenith Crown, but that will ultimately be your downfall. I've managed to do more with one crystal than you could ever with the rest of it."

Thaddeus stares stunned at the horrors before him.

"What have you done to yourself?"

"I introduced myself to the Zenith Crown, and as you can see, I found more than just complete destruction. I found purpose and resurrection."

"How?" Thaddeus asks, fear in his voice as bright light seeps from the wounds across the wolf's haggard body.

"With a little necromancy and a lot of self-sacrifice."

Ziegler steps forward until he's close enough to leap, pinning Thaddeus against his bookshelf, his palms burning into his skin as the Zenith Crown energy mutates him into something deadly.

"I'm one of them now, and that's something you can't control."

***

Across the manor, Phoenix hobbles into a large drawing room, transferring his power into the fireplace to bathe the room in an orange glow. He shakes the freezing torrent off his fur as the flames in the hall are doused.

In the far corner of the room, Aarden stares down at his shaking hands, watching his tears become lost in his already soaked lap.

"I couldn't save him in time," Aarden says, his voice breaking, "or control time for long enough to make any difference."

"It wasn't your responsibility to save him. It's my fault he fell, I practically pushed him off," Phoenix says, catching the towel Kyran throws at him and draping it over Aarden as he throws his black raincoat aside.

"Why can't I control my adaptation?" Aarden asks, wiping his eyes in tattered green sleeves.

"It will come to you--

"In time?"

Phoenix embraces Aarden, convinced he can say much more with his warm hug than with his words.

The Zenith collapse onto chairs, each still reeling from the nightmares they've endured.

"Something's not right, I can feel it," Kyran says, leaping back from deep within the manor with an arm-full of embroidered towels.

"What is it?" Kamala asks, kneeling by the fire.

"I can't explain it, I just feel it," Kyran responds, adjusting his bent frames.

The doors click open, causing them all to rise. Zephyr steps into the room. "Indigo is going to be okay, they're just unconscious from the poison. We should retrieve Thorne and Ziegler's bodies from the garden when we get a chance. Then we have to leave, even if we have to carry Indigo out with us."

"What about Thaddeus, what are we going to do about him?" Kyran asks.

Zephyr doesn't know how much more pain his heart can take.

"We have nothing left to say to him. He was willing to give up Aarden. We've always just been weapons to him, we have to get away from all of this," Zephyr says, looking into Kamala's eyes, guilty its taken him this long to piece it all together.

"I can't leave him," Kyran says.

"Kyran, we've got no other choice," Phoenix reminds him, trying his best to not allow the anger to bubble to the surface.

The panther bites his lip.

"There has to be a logical explanation to all of this, but I guess I just can't understand it now. Where would we go, there's nothing out there for us."

"None of that matters, as long as we have each other," Kamala assures him.

"We should at least get some answers," Kyran concludes.

On their way up the stairs, their calls for Thaddeus go unanswered as the five peer into the manor's many rooms.

They're one landing below Thaddeus's study when Zephyr's ears perk up and he stops the others in their place. A soft humming fills the air as the storm outside dies.

"Do you hear that?" Zephyr asks, worried that his senses are still too damaged to rely on.

"The singing?" Kamala asks, "I can hear it too."

Zephyr's call for Thaddeus receives a response from the private study.

"Enter," Ziegler's deep voice commands.

Kyran meets Phoenix's stare with eyes full of fear.

"How did he survive?" He asks.

"No idea, but this ends now," Zephyr whispers, nodding to Kyran and Phoenix.

The lion kicks the heavy doors open as the panther leaps to aid Thaddeus, who stirs slightly as he leans against a bookcase.

"What did you do to him?" Kyran demands as the four other Zenith aim their adaptations at the wolf.

"I did onto him the same punishment he believed you all deserved. I introduced him to this," Ziegler says, holding a vial of liquid crystal to the light under the green glass of Thaddeus's desk lamp.

"Is he alive?" Zephyr asks.

"Barely," Kyran says, "but he's too weak for me to leap him out of here, we need to get him somewhere safe. By the looks of it, Ziegler dragged him up the spiral staircase here."

"You'll do no such thing," Ziegler says, meeting his son eye to eye in the center of the room. The wolf's muzzle twists into a devilish grin.

"Zephyr, my boy, so glad you could make it. I wanted you to be present for this glorious moment."

Ziegler reaches beneath Thaddeus's desk to present the Zenith Crown and Aarden's Zeitkanone. The crystalline blossom illuminates the room with its enigmatic warbling. Immediately, Aarden senses it, the strange magnetic pull to it.

"Everything we've fought for has been over this. Something so small, I can hide it in my hands, but there's no hiding the impact this has had on your lives. Some of you wouldn't be here without it. So small, yet so incredible, it created marvels such as yourselves. The lengths Thaddeus went to keep this from me is quite outstanding, but here we are. The Zenith Crown, a mastermind, and the beings born from our power, reunited."

"Put it down," Zephyr warns him as the power seeps into Ziegler's altered veins, illuminating his body from within as the energy pulsing in his hands singes his calloused paw pads.

"It's incredible, but incomplete," Ziegler says, his newfound power approaching an equilibrium with the Zenith.

Thaddeus groans as Kyran shakes him.

"I wouldn't bother with him. Ironic how his fate is to end up like the many failed experiments he discarded. I guess he didn't have it in him."

Ziegler snaps his jaw shut along his sharp canine, breaking his tooth in half and revealing the orange crystal cut to fit into his maw.

"The missing piece," Ziegler says, spitting blood onto Thaddeus and jamming the jewel into the pistil of the floral formation, causing the entire Zenith Crown to tremble violently, snapping the heavy desk as it exerts a small shockwave of energy.

"I don't understand," Ziegler says, slipping Aarden's new, untested cannon onto his arm, "It's--

"Unstable," Aarden whispers to himself, the realization flooding his mind with ideas.

Lightning arcs from Ziegler's onyx storm cloud fur and onto the jagged, symmetrical patterns of the Zenith Crown, deflecting the energy into the walls around them.

Kamala shields them behind a crystalline barrier as Phoenix helps Kyran pull Thaddeus to the safety of the library.

"What's happening?" Ziegler demands, pulling at the crystals resisting him, searing their patterns into his hands, "It shouldn't be resisting me!"

"It's not all there!" Aarden shouts as a bolt of violet lightning collides into the shelf beside his ear.

"The other Zeitkanone," Kyran realizes as he steps back into the room, leaping away with Aarden as the others step back into the hallway behind the cover of Kamala's shield.

***

Aarden rolls on the hardwood floor of his bedroom, rising despite the objections of his spinning head to look through his memories and his room for the cannon Fletcher gave back to him.

"You keep something as important as that hidden under your bed?" Kyran asks, as Aarden's tail sways back in forth before him.

"There's no better place to hide things," Aarden says, opening the side of the original Zeitkanone to bathe the room in a bright emerald glow.

"There's two of them," Kyran says, squinting at the rich emerald light, "that's why it's unstable."

"Two identical Zenith Crown crystals from two different timelines. He's going to blow up this house and everyone in it if we don't stop him in time," Aarden says, closing the compartment and slipping the cannon onto his arms. "Giving Thaddeus the new cannon was a terrible idea."

"You trusted him. I've made the same mistake," Kyran says, extending his hand to help him rise.

"Besides, what better way to fight fire than with fire. Your quick thinking may just save us."

"I can at least save someone tonight," Aarden says, thinking of Thorne as he takes Kyran's hand. But they don't leap through the air. Instead, a blast of citrine energy strikes Kyran across his chest, launching him against the wall beside the window where he falls, laying perfectly still in a cloud of dust and shattered glass.

A shadow veiled in black peers down at Aarden through dark lenses.

"Hand it over," they command.

"Like hell I will," Aarden says, igniting the cannon and launching the assailant back into the wall with a burst of green energy.

"Wake up!" Aarden says, shaking Kyran, but his eyes only open slightly as he grips his chest in anguish.

"There's someone else here! I'll be back, I'll get the others," Aarden says, running out of his bedroom and up through a hidden staircase in the walls.

***

Outside of the study, Kamala launches bursts of energy at Ziegler, launching him violently against the framed memories lining the halls.

The sound of Aarden's cannon rings beneath them.

"You didn't think I'd come alone, did you?" Ziegler asks, black blood seeping from his mouth as the unbearable pain of his transformation begins to take hold.

Through gritted teeth he growls his final words.

"Every cause gains followers. From the powerful to the power hungry. I happened to find someone who was both," the wolf says before falling to the ground, his arms and legs stretching as he transforms into something sinister.

A dark shadow turns the corner, shooting at them with a device identical to Aarden's cannon, the backup left behind at Apex Genetics.

Zephyr and Phoenix take blasts of orange energy to their chests. The energy causes the flames on Phoenix's mane to extinguish and the luminance in Zephyr's ruby eyes to dim deep garnet.

"I told you we'd find a way to cure your unusual illness," a familiar raspy voice says to Kamala from behind a dark helmet as Zephyr and Phoenix struggle to regain their footing.

"You take orders from Ziegler now, Kane?" Kamala asks, "now we know why you think he's so untouchable. I never took you as the jealous type."

Venus Kane tosses her helmet onto the floor, her gray eyes glaring coldly at Kamala. Stepping forward, the hyena aims the cannon directly at the crystalline barrier.

"You didn't think your day would come did you? What do you think this has all been about? You rich kids have spent so long pretending to be heroes, you forget the lives you've destroyed along the way. In the world of the powerless, power is earned. But to the likes of you, it's gained by either wealth or influence, and Thaddeus Axton made sure you all destroyed every rung on the ladder with your recklessness as he paid your way to the top. You've done nothing to earn the power that's been given to you, and if you're not willing to give it up voluntarily, I'll take it until there's nothing left of you to take."

"So that's what this has all been about, some personal vendetta?" Kamala asks, her rage fortifying the shield but draining her energy.

Kane sneers, pressing the cannon deeper into the barrier until it begins to crack.

"This isn't personal, I'm just bringing dangerous criminals to justice."

Leaning against a golden vase of glass flowers, Phoenix pushes himself against the wall, growling at her as the power within him wanes further.

"What are you going to do, arrest us?"

Kane sneers at the success of the cannon, eager to see the fire fade from all of their eyes.

"No, we finish this now. You deserve much worse, but this will do. You can't dodge justice this time."

"Dodge this," Aarden calls out from the end of the hall.

Kane is tossed aside by a burst of green energy aimed directly at her head. The hyena crashes through the stained-glass window at the end of the hall, landing on the roof before the hail of painted glass. She continues falling, rain splattering into the night air until she lands soundlessly somewhere in the garden.

Aarden falls back behind a sculpture as Kane's blast ricochets through the hallway behind him.

"Great timing!" Phoenix says, happy to see the red panda has recovered enough to fight.

From within the study, Ziegler wails, his body ripping through the wall as he surrenders control to the Zenith Crown power overwhelming him. The haggard wolf's body contorts and twists. Shards of crystal replace the bones in his body in a grotesque display that's excruciating for the Zenith to witness.

Ziegler screams until only a guttural sound echoes from his throat.

"That's new," Zephyr says as he regains control of his body in a way he never has before. For once, he can't feel the dark presence of the beast in his head.

The strength of Kane's blast causes the fire damaged hallway to collapse as Kamala keeps Ziegler at bay with a shield of solid crystal.

"No way left," Zephyr says.

"No way right either," Phoenix says, kneading the tender spot where the blast struck him before pulling Aarden into the shield.

"Where's Ky?" Phoenix asks as Ziegler's teeth transform into daggers of black obsidian.

"He can handle himself just fine," Kamala says as she pushes them into the observation room.

"I need to get to Indigo!" Phoenix says, eyeing her glowing hands as they prepare to fuse the door shut, "do you think you can handle Ziegler until I get back?"

Ziegler tears the door apart with sharp claws made of glowing crystal. He shrieks, launching waves of multicolored energy, breaking the windows behind them as his mind slips away into primal instinct. Cold early morning air rushes into the curved room as the rain on the roof splashes onto them.

"I'm sure I can handle him just fine!" Kamala says, launching energy blasts that ricochet off Ziegler's impenetrable body as shards of crystal begin to cut through the blood-soaked fur along his spine.

"Great!" Phoenix says, the sarcasm flying right over him as he runs under Ziegler's growing arms to race down the hallway.

Ziegler shakes his head as his final thoughts slip into the beast. He lunges at the three before him, his mind telling him to rip and tear to feed off their energy like a vampire.

"We could use a full moon right about now," Kamala says as Ziegler's crystal claws begin to break through the rose gemstone shield.

"I would if I could, but for the first time, I can't hear him in my head, and I'm kind of enjoying it," Zephyr says, falling backward over a chair as they're pushed toward the jagged glass of the shattered window.

"At least one of us is," Aarden says, his own deflected energy blasts showering them with splintered wood as they crash through the roof above.

Ziegler lunges and bites through the barrier, pushing Zephyr, Kamala and Aarden to the ledge of the broken windows of the manor's third floor. Aarden slips, his hands landing on glass and cold rainwater as he feels the cold breeze against the back of his head.

The beast that was once Ziegler rips the chandelier from the ceiling, bathing the room in the glow of pink light accompanied by flashes of green from Aarden's cannon.

"Get behind me," Zephyr says, gripping Kamala's waist and pulling Aarden's shoulders as he turns his back, his eyes closed in anticipation to the searing pain of Ziegler's claws stabbing his heart through his back, but something even more painful crushes Zephyr's heart as his father's claws bury themselves in a being born from suddenly appearing black smoke.

Kyran falls lifeless at their feet, his anguish sliding on the surface of his glossy coat of inky fur. He sacrificed himself to save them.

Kamala channels all her grief into a single beam that launches Ziegler back into Thaddeus's study, his body loudly breaking through the walls.

Aarden shakes Kyran, but the fire behind his eyes is long dowsed by blood and rain.

Zephyr pulls Aarden away, but the red panda fights back with a strength that surprises him.

"I'll fix this," Aarden whispers to Kyran's body as Ziegler howls and rises to attack those that remain.

"We have to find the others, there's no time," Zephyr says, holding Kamala's shaking hand to guide her out of the room.

***

In the floor far below, Phoenix races down identical looking hallways to find Indigo. The fire damaged floor buckles under his weight, but he traverses the manor through its hidden staircases, the path to the medical wing still vivid in his head.

Phoenix swings the door open, but only empty beds greet him. When he turns around, a heavy intravenous pole strikes him over the head, causing his body to smash into the ground through a broken bed.

"Shit! I'm so sorry," Indigo says through hands that cover their mouth. Phoenix reaches out blindly as he tries to regain sight through the field of stars in his vision.

"You couldn't tell it was me?" Phoenix asks, rubbing his forehead, surprised his hands aren't soaked in his hot blood.

"I can't, not with Thorne's poison and the sedatives in my system, it diminishes my adaptation," Indigo says, kneeling beside him.

"That's good to know for when someone tries to activate you again."

"You don't know how hurtful that is."

"Does it hurt more than a fucking metal rod to the nose?"

"I said I was sorry!"

"Whatever, are you okay?"

Indigo tosses the pole aside.

"What's going on up there? Can't I trudge through my nightmarish hallucinations in peace?"

"Are you okay?" Phoenix asks, rising to pull on the beds two at a time to barricade the heavy doors, "Are you yourself again?"

"Is everything okay?"

"Are you still under his command?"

"I don't know!" Indigo says, pulling on a bed, but only managing to make it scrape loudly across the floor a few inches.

"It's too much to explain right now, but Ziegler survived, he almost killed Thaddeus with the Zenith Crown. Kane showed up, but Aarden took care of her, but she may still be around. Oh, and Ziegler is now this huge crystal monster because he fused with the Zenith Crown. Actually, that pretty much covers it."

Indigos eyes widen.

"Well, that's fantastic! Okay, we can fight our way up to help the others if Kane shows up, but I may not be of much help to start, so you'll have to do most of the fighting. But I'm sure you can handle that, right?"

Phoenix grins nervously as he pushes more beds against the doors, hoping that Kyran will teleport the others to them any moment now.

"About that, I can't perform right now."

"Is that your excuse in bed too?"

"Indy, I'm being serious for once. I can't, she has this blaster, like Aarden's, that shoots Zenith Crown energy, and it takes away our adaptations. I haven't felt normal since she hit me with it. I feel warm for the first time and it's not a good feeling."

"That may be an issue," Indigo says as a pair of heavy boots kicks at the door. Phoenix leans against it, placing his entire weight against the beds, but the pounding on the door grows stronger.

"I know you're in there!" Kane shouts, the redwood splintering.

If Indigo could read Phoenix's mind in this moment, they would hear the final thoughts of a lion trapped in the cold, afraid and crushed by a weight he's not strong enough to bear, as he bravely embraces the end.

"Indigo," Phoenix calls out as Kane bursts holes into the walls, shattering the tall windows before him.

"What is it?"

"Get out of here, I can't hold her back for much longer."

Indigo stares out at the silent forest beyond the shattered garden, as the pre-dawn glow of their final day bathes the room in blue-green light.

"I won't leave you!" Indigo says, trying to push the bed alongside him but their efforts make no difference.

"You need to. I won't lose you again. I'll be fine, I promise."

Indigo shakes their head.

"It's going to be okay cottontail," Phoenix says through a strained smile. "I'll see you again. I trust Aarden."

Indigo wraps their arms around the larger lion, tucking their head in his chest.

If the way Indigo clings to him doesn't tell Phoenix that they feel the same way, the gentle kiss the rabbit plants on his lips tells him everything he needs to know.

Phoenix plants his feet on the ground and pushes, his deafening roar echoing through the tall room as Indigo runs as fast as they can into the forest, too afraid to look back for the first time in their life.

As soon as Indigo is too far away to see, Phoenix lets go and stands tall in the center of the room. Each one of Kane's blasts pushes him backward, filling his breaking heart with pain until he has nothing left to feel.

***

In the floors far above, Zephyr, Kamala and Aarden make their way toward the foyer of the manor as the first rays of dawn slip through the glass ceiling, bathing the silvery room in shades of deep blue.

"Phoenix and Indigo should be here by now. Where are they?" Zephyr asks, but the unfamiliar cadence of heavy footsteps approaching tells them Kane survived.

Dietrich Ziegler's eyes stalk them from the darkness, the familiar fiery red glow within them the last thing remaining of Zephyr's father as the wolf's twisting and expanding body grows too wide to fit through the archway.

Zephyr raises his arms up as he approaches Ziegler.

"Dietrich! Dad, don't give in to the monster, there's always a way to fight it."

The beast howls, throwing his large paw against the archway and banister, sending ornately carved leaves and flowers tumbling toward them.

"I think he's far beyond reasoning with," Kamala says.

"It's never too late. Both of you, go find the others. I won't let him hurt anyone else tonight," Zephyr says as Ziegler circles them, sensing the fear in the air.

The Zenith Crown radiates in otherworldly light as it slices through the crystallized bone on Ziegler's back, the conquest of its host nearly complete.

"I won't leave you behind," Kamala reassures him, creating a crystalline shield that splits the dawn into seven colors.

"I have an idea," Aarden says, staring at the Zeitkanone fused with crystal onto Ziegler's right arm.

"This plan of yours, could it bring Kyran back?" Kamala asks, Aarden seeing helplessness in her eyes for the first time.

"I can't guarantee it will, but it may just bring us all back," Aarden says, flipping the switches on his own Zeitkanone, causing it to roar to life.

Sensing his moment, Ziegler charges toward them to make the kill. Zephyr pushes through Kamala's shield to face his father, ready to forgive him for the monsters he's made, but all he finds is pain as Ziegler's arm transforms into a jagged spire of crystal that pierces Zephyr cleanly through his heart.

Kamala can no longer suppress her anguish. She screams, launching a wave of energy that showers them in shards of glass from above as Ziegler scores her shield with crystal claws. She pushes, but her own reflection in the pink quartz shatters.

"Aarden, don't be afraid, find your power and use it," Kamala says as her shield finally shatters and the sharp crystal pierces her body, killing her.

Shaken by the gruesome sight before him, Aarden raises trembling hands as the cannon whirs to life.

Concentrating, Aarden drowns out all of the fear until he pulls Elio Xavier's memory from the back of his head, his voice comforting him in what is certain to be his final moments.

"There will come a time, maybe one closer than either of us could ever imagine, where you'll be left all alone, and all that remains of me will be the unsaid."

Aarden shouts, shooting a blast of green energy above Ziegler's head to show him he holds the same power in his own hands.

"This fight you're preparing me for, what's it for?"

The beast shrieks and stares at the weapon in his arm, understanding what he's capable of.

"It's for something much greater than any of us."

"What role do I play in it?"

Ziegler taps into the emerald coloredemerald-colored energy in the Zeitkanone, making the dark red blood at their feet run black as the foyer is filled with green light.

"A crucial one."

"Will you be there?"

Aarden thinks of the desert and the rust coloredrust-colored landscape he explored with Elio Xavier as he walks bravely toward the chilling embrace of death.

"In a way."

He closes his eyes, thinking only of the others so he doesn't feel alone.

"Then how much time do we have left?"

"That, Aarden, is solely yours to determine."

Ziegler and Aarden fire simultaneously. The identical rays of green plasma strike each other in the center of the room. Like throwing stone into a gentle lake, the waves of time ripple outward as the power of two identical Zenith gems collide violently, launching both of them backward.

Aarden closes his eyes, expecting everything to fade to darkness as it did before, wondering if he will wake up with the same sense of calm he did the last time. But when his eyes open, he's suspended in the ripples of time, everything flowing slowly as his feet abandon the ground, his torn jacket catching the ethereal wind like a torn flag.

He pushes through, splitting from his own body like a ghost as time loops around them. He looks back and sees himself collide with the wall, and the sounds of his cracking skull repeat in an infinite loop. Despite his body coming close to exhaustion, Aarden pushes forward, causing time to flow backward small moments at a time until the energy flows back into the cannons.

Aarden pushes forward like a ship in a turning tempest, the waves growing calmer as the past becomes clearer.

Minutes slip back through the hourglass, and Kamala's shield reforms, a minute more and Zephyr is by her side.

"I can fix this, it's not over yet!" Aarden yells, stretching his mind further as minutes build to hours, and the rising sun slips back into a stormy night. As Aarden loses himself in the ripples of time, the manor's drawing room melts in to focus, and he finds himself staring down at his own hands, watching the tears fall onto his already soaked lap.

***

"I can control my own powers!" Aarden tells Phoenix, distinctive bewilderment coming across his face as the towel Kyran throws at him crashes onto his head.

"You can?" Phoenix asks.

Aarden nods excitedly, "maybe even better than you can!"

"I wasn't expecting that after what just happened, are you feeling alright, kid?" Phoenix asks, but Aarden rises to catch Kyran.

"Something's not right, I can feel it," Aarden and Kyran say in unison.

"How did you know what I was going to say?" Kyran asks, before a spark of understanding shines in his large, amber eyes.

"You did it?"

Aarden nods, elation running through him as he glances around at everyone's concerned faces.

"How!?" Kyran asks as Zephyr steps into the room.

Aarden rises, brushing rain off his green jacket as he glares at his hands.

"There's plenty of time to explain that later. Dietrich Ziegler is alive and in Thaddeus's study and it's not too late to save them both. Ziegler also has Kane waiting outside for his command. We need to act now; everything is on the line."

As the team surrounds Kyran, he looks down at Aarden, the curiosity burning too hot to hide.

"Did it end well for us?"

Aarden shakes his head.

"I don't know if I can turn the clock back again, so let's make this one count. I'll need to go to my room first."

Later, the Zenith leap through air to re-materialize in Thaddeus Axton's study, where Ziegler jolts and points Aarden's second Zeitkanone at them.

"Zephyr, my boy, so glad you could make it. I wanted--

Aarden launches Ziegler back into the wall with a powerful blast from his original cannon, kicking up a cloud of dust and debris.

"That was for trying to kill me back in London," Aarden says.

Ziegler reaches desperately for the Zenith Crown, but Zephyr's instincts are sharper, and he clutches it. The energy within surges ruby red, attacking the wolf's senses as it drains him of his power.

"Let go!" Phoenix urges, reaching for it, "I can hold onto it."

"We can manage it better together," Zephyr says, grimacing as the energy pulsates deep within him, igniting his veins like molten steel. Phoenix joins him, screaming as he places his hands on the jagged crystal.

Kamala and Kyran reach over to hold onto the crystalline flower, the siphoning of their power now shared between the four of them.

Aarden hesitates, but then he too reaches for it, screaming as if his entire body is being struck by lightning and burning from within.

"Do you have any idea what you're going to cause?" Ziegler says, his eyes shifting wildly as he backs into the wall near Thaddeus.

"No idea," Aarden admits, his vision beginning to fade to black as he struggles to maintain his balance, "but I'm sure you're afraid we're finally going to stop you."

Ziegler cackles, sitting beside Thaddeus as the arcs of lightning crash into his powerful body.

"So powerful, yet so naïve. You don't win by stopping me. Because with or without me, your destiny is inescapable, and it's impossible to prevent it from happening, no matter how many times you turn the clock back."

Aarden pushes words through the pain.

"You may need to reconsider what you think is possible," Aarden says.

"One day you'll realize I was the one who was trying to save you. There's always another time then," Ziegler says as he activates his Zeitkanone.

Ziegler snaps his powerful jaw onto his tooth and throws the orange gem into the Zeitkanone as he aims, not at the beings born from the Zenith Crown, but at the crystalline flower itself in an attempt to kill the source of their power. The blast shatters the Zenith Crown, causing the entire side of Thaddeus's manor to explode in a fireball bathing the early morning in an inferno of orange light.

When sets of exhausted eyes open to the early dawn, they see their world destroyed behind the warm glow of a roaring fire. Expecting pink crystal, they're surprised to see Phoenix standing before them, his arms outstretched, the unwavering gaze of absolute concentration on his face.

"I guess I can control my adaptation now too," Phoenix says to Aarden, smiling brightly as parts of the manor collapses onto the garden.

In the middle of the flaming pearl, Thaddeus Axton stirs awake, his eyes opening to the dimming stars beyond a sky of fire above.

"Kyran, find Indigo," Phoenix says as he extinguishes the fire by channeling it into his body as they stand in the ruins of Thaddeus's garden.

Kyran teleports away as Phoenix tames the flames for the first time. At the edge of the forest, Venus Kane witnesses' parts of the manor collapse, smoke barreling toward her.

When the last of the smoke is carried away by the gentle breeze all that remains before them is a dazzling light as the Zenith hums menacingly, igniting the air around it and burning the ground it lays on as it reconstructs itself.

"Can someone please explain to me what's happening?" Indigo asks as they land beside them, regaining their senses, both ordinary and extraordinary.

"Someone lost control, and it wasn't me this time, or you," Phoenix says winking at them, relieved to see they're themselves again.

Through the ashes, Ziegler's voice shouts in frustration and anguish, calling desperately for the last ally he has left to save him.

"Venus, please!" he shouts as he lays in the field of flowers, the fur on his body burning.

At the edge of the forest, Venus Kane throws her helmet on the ground, staring at horror into a power she can't possibly control.

"What have you done Dietrich?" The hyena growls to herself as she disappears back into the forest, walking until she can no longer hear her name echoing throughout the trees. Unbeknownst to the Zenith, in this timeline, she's Venus Kane-Ziegler, and her eyes mist as she abandons her love, knowing the power has consumed him.

Alone, Ziegler crawls through the scorched earth, reaching for the Zenith Crown, unwilling to surrender despite every objection of his breaking body.

"I won't deny my destiny," Ziegler says.

"Dietrich! We've seen what the power can do. You've proven your dedication, but you can't possibly control it. Let go before it kills us all!" Thaddeus pleads.

The wolf hesitates, his deep red glaring into Thaddeus's blue.

The wolf makes his choice. He picks the deadliest flower in the garden, transferring power deep into a shattered body that burns from within in dazzling orange flames.

It happens too quickly for him to even scream.

What becomes of Dietrich Ziegler rides along the pre-dawn zephyr. The cinders travel through a soundless forest before landing on the surface of a serene lake, the rising sun reflecting off its mirrored surface.

The Zenith Crown pulsates energy outward, crystalizing the ground below it while incinerating anything it comes into contact with as it brings an end to their world.

"I have a feeling it's not going to stop until it destroys everything in its path," Kamala says as the flowers at her feet become pillars of jagged crystal.

"I guess those who were afraid we'd bring about the apocalypse were right," Kyran says as powerful gusts of ethereal wind rush toward the Zenith from all directions.

"Who said we'd bring forth the apocalypse?" Indigo asks, Phoenix holding onto them.

"I did," Kyran says, light reflecting off his glasses.

"Well, whatever it is, we have to stop it!" Kamala says.

"I have to admit, this timeline is much cooler than the last one, but it may end just as badly for us," Aarden shouts over the squalls.

The Zenith crystal inside Aarden's cannon tears through the steel, wedging itself into formation alongside Ziegler's canine tooth.

Equal rays of malachite energy surge toward the sky, spiraling around itself like a helix as they reach for the stars above like a beacon signaling to the world the end of time itself.

Aarden shields his eyes from the blinding light with his arm. An idea creeps into his head as he stares at the empty casing of the cold steel and copper Zeitkanone.

"It's inevitable," Aarden says, rising and pushing forward against the hurricane of electromagnetic energy.

Kamala pushes herself with all her strength, keeping herself balanced with her strong tail as she reaches for Aarden's tattered emerald jacket.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm putting a stop to it. Can't you see, it has to be me."

"Aarden, you're one of us, whatever it is you're planning on doing, you don't have to do it alone."

Aarden grins, "I don't think were waking up in our comfortable beds in another timeline after this one, Kamala. I think this could be it, and I won't ask any of you to do this for me. This is my cycle to break. It's the unintended consequence of trying to save you all. I admit I was careless, but I did it so I wouldn't have to lose any of you ever again. But maybe time is something that can't be changed. This is the only way to end it."

"Then we break the cycle together, even if it ends us," Zephyr assures him, his red hair dancing in the wind like fire.

"Do you mean dying for real this time?" Phoenix asks to the grim faces around him, "we can't fix this?"

"If you'd rather walk away, I won't blame you," Aarden says, his mind made up.

"I'm done walking away. I'm ready," Phoenix says, staring up at the beam of light burning the orange sky.

"What do you need us to do?" Kyran asks.

"Hold onto the Zenith Crown, then hold onto me, so I'm not alone when I die."

"You'll never be alone, we'll always be right beside you," Kamala says.

Phoenix hugs Aarden as the others rise and link arms with Kyran.

"I hope it's a garden," Aarden tells Phoenix, his tears flying into the iridescent vortex opening in the sky above.

"I know it will be," Phoenix says, looking back at Thaddeus, "even if I'm getting real tired of gardens."

"I know I'm not ready for it to end, but I'm not afraid because I know we're all going to the same place. We can't let this world be destroyed because of our mistakes," Indigo says, gripping Phoenix's hand closely.

"Besides, I have hope we'll find a way to make it back to each other, we always do."

United, no force can stop the Zenith as they march toward their end, and together, they push through by leaning on one another before Kyran leaps them the last stretch toward the Zenith Crown.

In the center of a burning garden, the six Zenith's place their hands on the power that brought them to this moment, the energy surging within them. As it reaches equilibrium, and the power retreats back into the flower, Aarden raises the Zeitkanone, knowing Kamala inadvertently polarized the steel to destroy the source of the power itself, not just the power living within them.

Aarden's final thought is of Quinn, wishing he could go back to that day and watch the fireworks forever with her.

Aarden drops his heavy arm down like a hammer, shattering the Zenith into shards rushing outward like stardust from a dying sun. The power surges outward as their grip on one another slips away, their combined Zenith energy painting the sky in a dazzling white light before everything goes dark.

The rest is silence.