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Paris, May 2015. Two months before the end of everything.

Somewhere far below Paris, a violet raccoon with a haunting past maneuvers blindly through narrow catacombs. The smell of moisture and decay fills her sensitive nose as the constant drip of rainwater onto stone ticks like the arms of a clock, or the sway of a metronome.

To Quinn, Paris transcends the metaphysical, as if the city of light exists at the crossroads between the corporeal and spiritual. She once believed London was the pinnacle of her obsession with the paranormal. That was until she first stepped into the graveyards of the French capital and discovered how alive the undead can truly be.

Since then, she's felt inexorably connected to the history of death and decay permeating every corner of the city she's called home for two years.

The independence Quinn now possesses is forged from loss, but she finds consolation in the catacombs. She spends most of her nights exploring the spiritual labyrinth underneath the city, never fearing becoming lost as the light of dawn always guides her back to safety.

Feeling the cool night air brush against her whiskers, Quinn spends the remainder of her night thinking about those buried beneath her, those who make her earthly despairs seem insignificant when compared to the suffering of the afterlife.

It may not be the best way to cope with her pain, but it's the only way she knows how to.

Quinn is drifting off to sleep, her head on a cold gravestone when her cellphone vibrates in her jeans.

"You know where I am, and no I'm not hungry. I'll be back by morning," Quinn says, uninterested in interacting with the world of the living. She glances around at the headstones, admiring them in the silent séance of the small cemetery.

After a few hours, she falls asleep until the rain wakes her. As the pre-dawn sky cuts through the starless night, Quinn finds her way back home via the metro. Departing the dirty station, she tucks her nose into her sweater so only her eyes peek through her straight fringe of raven and red hair. She walks down streets that grow more familiar with each passing day. Through a passage of brick alleyways and walls stained by soot and spray paint, Quinn makes it through a rusty door and up a tapered staircase where she finds Kamala under the greenhouse ceiling of their industrial loft.

It took time, but they carved a home for themselves in the last decay Paris has yet to bury underground. Over the last year, Quinn moved past the loss of her mother, if only to stop herself from the temptation of running back to London.

As the morning sun washes over them, Kamala yawns and stretches, baring her sharp teeth as the sound of the creaking metal doors fills the vast space.

"Good morning," Quinn says, undressing to lacy black layers for a bath.

"Morning," Kamala responds, cradling the branch of a dying houseplant in her warm palms.

"I'll never know how Zephyr did it. Why can't I keep one of these things alive, just once?" Kamala laments, digging through the cabinets in their makeshift kitchen.

"Too much effort, that's why I like things better dead."

"Of course, you would. So, how was the land of the dead?"

"Silent, just how I like it."

"Are you sure you're not better off making some living friends," Kamala suggests, concerned that someone Quinn's age should be out meeting someone, instead of spending her nights in cemeteries.

"Like the friends you make down at the nightclub. No thanks," Quinn responds, stripping down to her lingerie. She circles up the staircase and out of sight as Kamala prepares breakfast.

Kamala has long sacrificed her own desire of saving Zephyr to care for Quinn, but lately, she's been struggling with her role. She can't be the mother she's lost, and she's barely able to see her as a sibling, so she treats Quinn as a teammate, guiding but never pushing, allowing her to make her own mistakes and understanding that one day she'll leave and never return. As much as she wanted that in the past, she knows it will break her when she finally does. But she can't keep her safe forever. Quinn is right at the cusp of twenty, and she understands her time with her is ending.

Maybe then she can save Zephyr, if he isn't already gone.

***

Later that same day, Kamala and Quinn navigate through a bustling crowd of sightseers and tourists as they pack shoulder to shoulder to enjoy the sensations of spring in one of the immaculately maintained parks in the heart of Paris.

"Have you given any thought in going back to London?" Quinn asks, panting as her black clothing traps in the rays of scorching sunlight.

Kamala pushes closer to her to avoid a pack of wolves arguing over directions.

"I thought you liked it here."

"I do, I just miss being home every once in a while. Why don't we take the tunnel back sometime? Besides, the guys here are a lot more complicated."

"I didn't think you were interested in finding someone," Kamala says, listening in to the conversations around them.

"I might be. I figured you would too. Paris is a romantic city after all, isn't it?"

Kamala scoffs.

"Do I look like the romantic type? Relationships are simple for me. You're attracted or you're not." The panther says, staring back at the large swaying rear of a voluptuous lioness as she passes by.

"Like magnets?" Quinn teases, seeing what she's focusing so intensely on. Kamala breaks her gaze and peers down at her, the flustered red skin underneath the shiny pink coat of her cheeks nearly visible.

"What about you, have you found a nice ghost you're willing to bring home in a jar to meet the parents?"

Kamala adjusts her headpiece, a white cowboy style hat she wears to her nightclub. The panther winks and jogs back to catch up with the lioness.

Too busy looking back at Kamala, Quinn crashes into a brawny yellow lion walking toward the glow of the sun.

"Watch the jacket," The lion growls in an American accent, brushing his jet black sleeves and huffing the scent of cigarettes onto her face.

"Piss off," Quinn growls.

Kamala catches up to her, her face obscured by the hat.

"She was not interested."

As they reach the large central fountain of an opulent municipal garden, Quinn turns to the panther.

"This seems like a good place."

"Are you ready?" Kamala asks.

"Let's make this quick."

Quinn disappears into the crowd as Kamala stands on the stone edge of the fountain, creating shards of crystalline energy in the sunny park by tapping into the Zenith Crown energy within her. The edges of her eyesight become blurry as wisps of pink vapor seep out of the corners of her mouth and eyes.

It begins with a single gasp, then eventually a large crowd surrounds her as more spires materialize before them.

As the crowd gazes in bewilderment at Kamala's adaptation, Quinn maneuvers around the crowd like a ghost, snatching watches, wallets and jewelry toward her deep pockets. This is their daily routine, stealing to survive in a city they can command with their power if they wanted to.

She pulls a heavy gold ring off a lean black panther, who shoves at the gawkers to get a better view.

Quinn winks at Kamala, signaling she's ready. She's racing toward the other side of the crowd when the large lion she ran into earlier grips her wrist, the ring clanging loudly onto the cobblestone path in the sunny park.

"The ring," Phoenix says, pulling the raccoon toward him, "or I break your wrist."

"This ring?" Quinn asks, distracting him with one hand as she slashes at him with the other with her sharp nails, grazing his arm and tearing the sleeve off his jacket.

"Sorry, I forgot to watch the jacket there," Quinn says, slipping through the crowd as Phoenix roars and clutches his bleeding arm.

Quinn runs through the cover of pink shields until she's met with a cloud of dense black fog.

"Kamala!" Quinn shouts as she trips beside the fountain.

"Quinn!" Kamala shouts, recognizing the smoke. She leaps off the fountain, clutching the ring that rolls toward her. It melts in her hands, the molten gold spilling onto the ground. Kamala runs toward the fading smoke.

Kyran rematerializes from the air, glaring at her the same way he did in the garden.

"I like the long hair. If you tied it up, you'd blend right in with the other Parisians," Kamala says, catching her breath.

"We have a lot to talk about," Kyran says flatly, unamused by the commotion around him.

On the other side of the garden, a short blue rabbit runs against the panicked crowd.

"I'm just looking for some answers," Indigo says, pushing past the crowd to walk up to Quinn.

"Don't make me hurt you," Quinn says.

Indigo peers at her with shining eyes.

"Would you like to see some magic?"

Indigo dives into Quinn's ghostly eyes, pulling a recent and vivid fear from her memories.

An ear-splitting howl chills the blood in Indigo's veins to ice as the illusion of Quinn's fear materializes, every tooth, claw and snarl arising from cobalt-colored magic.

The ghostly shadow of a werewolf barks and runs toward them, his starving eyes set to devour the small prey trembling against the tall walls of the fountain.

"How are you doing this?" Indigo asks her, nearly falling back into the rushing water of the fountain.

"What do you mean? You're the one who called him!"

"I'm supposed to be showing you your biggest fears sweetheart, not the other way around."

Indigo's heart beats in their throat as they stagger on top of the violet raccoon, nearly knocking them both into the metallic smelling water.

"He is my biggest fear!" Quinn yells, pushing Indigo off her as Zephyr's teeth cut right through them like a ghost.

"What the hell is going on, who are you?" Indigo asks, peering into teal eyes hidden behind heavy black eyeliner.

"You took the words right out of my head," Quinn says. "But I remember who you are."

***

Kamala raises her fist to attack Kyran, but the expression on his face isn't angry. He looks at her with deep pain behind her eyes.

"I'm not here to fight you, I have something to tell you."

"Is this the Champ de Mars?" Aarden asks between bites of a crepe, interrupting him. The red panda places the map back into his green backpack and rises from a park bench, allowing a panicked cyclist to pass by before walking up to them.

"So, did you figure out your adaptation yet?" Kamala asks, taking a hesitant step back as the others join the reunion.

"You don't know?" Phoenix asks, whistling.

Kamala observes Aarden closely, contemplating.

"What? What can he do?"

"I don't think she knows, Phoenix. You're one of the lucky ones then, I'm their secret weapon!" Aarden says, tossing his crepe on the floor and cracking his knuckles.

Quinn cuts through the onlookers, Indigo not far behind her.

"Bloody hell, you really are the Zenith!" the raccoon says.

"No, we're the Spice Girls. Of course, we're The Zenith, who else would we be?" Indigo asks, manipulating the crowd to walk toward the garden gates and block the officers who yell commands at them.

"You all look so different. You're the one who got cut from the team, right?" Quinn asks Phoenix.

"I left voluntarily," Phoenix says, scoffing as they make their way out of the park.

"And who's the new bloke?" Quinn asks, staring at the red-panda who hasn't taken his eyes off her.

"Do you have a safe place where we can talk?" Kyran asks Kamala, adjusting his glasses.

***

Later, as the first signs of evening rise with the setting sun, Kamala guides the Zenith through the heart of the end of workday rush. Once they're off their second station, they make it to an oasis hidden amongst the art and intrigue of Paris. There, a lavish nightclub with commanding marble pillars stands out against the backdrop of the darkening sky.

"Subtle," Kyran says looking up at the pink neon cursive built into the frieze of the temple-like structure forming the words, The Pink Panther.

"Funny enough, that was the name before I won the nightclub," Kamala says, greeting the bouncer. "It was a bathhouse before that."

"How did you win a nightclub?" Indigo asks, peering into the rainbow lights within.

"Astonishing how much men are willing to lose just to prove a woman can't beat them in a fight. An old dog from Amsterdam bet me this entire place. He hasn't been able to feel his face or set foot in France since," Kamala says, adjusting the rose hair tied back under her cowboy style hat.

"Now you're making me jealous," Phoenix says, opening his arms for an embrace.

"There's nothing to be jealous about. It's just me, a nightclub, beautiful ladies and a supply of drink deep enough to dive in," she says, winking.

Kamala pulls from embracing Indigo and Aarden when she meets Kyran's radiant eyes.

"Like I said, we have things to discuss," he says.

"Do we? Quinn, why don't you head back home, I'll show the guys around," Kamala says, removing the hat to tuck under her arm as she runs her hands through her long hair.

"Actually, Quinn, take Aarden with you," Kamala says, gesturing for the others to follow with the pink diamond tipped cane the bouncer hands to her.

"This place isn't safe for someone like him, with no adaptation at all," she says, Aarden having admitted the truth to her on the train ride to the nightclub.

"I'm staying here," Aarden protests, "you can't keep excluding me from everything."

"Aarden," Kyran says before the red panda interrupts him.

"I'm tired of feeling like I'm in everyone's way, like I'm standing around with nothing to do. I'm a part of this team too!"

Kamala thinks of her younger self as she peers into Aarden's teary eyes.

"Being a part of this means for better or worse, are you sure about this?"

"As far as I'm concerned, you're stuck with me," Aarden says, grinning.

"Well then, come into my world," Kamala says, placing the cowboy hat on Aarden's head as she leads them into her night club.

***

A pulsing bass-line ebbs under a booming drumbeat, echoing off stone walls as it travels through the thermae-like dance floor of The Pink Panther. Jets of warm water shoot from the floor to the rhythm of the unrelenting music. The nightclub is an amalgam of faux Greco-Roman architecture and Parisian fashion.

In an office overlooking an energetic dance floor, the loud laughter between a reunited family sails above the sound-waves leaking through the padded walls.

"Didn't that guy end up coming to the house to look for you the next day?" Kamala asks Indigo as another round of bubbly drinks is passed around.

"He wasn't looking for me, he was looking for a blue fox he thought he had a chance with. Worst first date ever," Indigo says, their words slurring slightly as they find the bottom of the glass. The rabbit peers down through a large curved window, studying every movement below. The rest of the nightclub is decorated in the style of a Greek garden, complete with bartenders dressed as cupids and champagne fountains.

"So, what's up with the outfit?" Indigo asks, turning back to collapse onto a pillowy pink sofa.

"It's a character I play for the night club. I'm supposed to be this loud-mouthed American cowgirl, but we all know I'd rather let my pistol do all the talking for me," Kamala says, extending her index finger and thumb as she accepts another drink.

Kyran yet again dismisses the drink offered to him with a wave of his hand before pulling a mug from Aarden's grasp as soon as his lips touch the foam.

Aarden mumbles and accepts a soda instead, convinced Kyran would allow him his first drink after hours of trying.

The others continue to reminisce in past mischief before Kyran speaks over them.

"Why didn't you come back after all this time?" Kyran asks his twin sister, the music giving him a headache.

"Ky, you're killing the vibe," Phoenix says, the drinks stoking his fire.

Kamala doesn't hesitate to answer as she sets down her empty glass.

"Why didn't you come looking for me? I obviously haven't done a good job at hiding. Ziegler hasn't paid me a visit either, which is even more baffling. Ziegler knows I'm here, but he wants me to be afraid of him. All our lives, he could've just walked right up to our front door, but he never did. You're exactly like him in that sense, Kyran. You want us to come crawling back to you because you're convinced it gives you leverage. I knew exactly where you all were. From Indigo's Vegas residency to Phoenix's little vacation in Mexico earlier this year," Kamala says, winking at the large lion.

"So you're stalking us? Well, there's an idea! You could've told us about Quinn. We have a right to know about her, and about Soraya Singh," Kyran says, lamenting the news Kamala told him earlier that same evening about their mother.

He lingers on how strange of a roller coaster of emotions it is to know someone he thought was dead was alive, but is now truly gone.

It's as if she died twice.

"That, I'll apologize for, but I needed to protect her. I tried to do it the right way at first, instead of doing what Dad did with us."

"But instead, you have her pickpocketing and stealing to survive," Kyran says, scoffing.

Kamala leans forward.

"I tried to do the honest thing at first. I even went looking for Ziegler. He abandoned his lab, and his last known address here in Paris was abandoned years ago. I tried to get an honest job, but I wasn't making enough, so I worked here as a burlesque dancer. The owner didn't appreciate me doing the job of the bouncer as well, so he fired me. That's when I challenged him and took his fucking nightclub. The girls don't have to dance anymore, and Quinn doesn't have to break into hotels to sleep anymore. I tried to be honest, but I guess it's ingrained into us, to become like Thaddeus."

Kyran contemplates, the sides of his powerful jaw flexing as he presses his sharp teeth together.

"So where do we go from here?"

Kamala's body eases as she leans back in her seat, shrugging.

"We'll figure that out tomorrow. Enjoy the rest of the night, when's the last time you went out and had some fun, Kyran?"

Kyran mutters to himself, vanishing down to the lower level with his adaptation. He maneuvers around dancing patrons on his way to the restrooms, the music pounding piercingly in his head.

"What are the odds you introduce me to one of your angels down there?" Phoenix asks, his cold nose pressed against the smooth glass, "I've always wanted to be a bartender."

"Zero," Kamala answers, watching Kyran disappear into the crowd.

Some time later, Kyran stares into a lipstick stained mirror, pulling his wavy jet-black hair up into a bun to see how it would look, when a pair of crimson eyes glare back at him in the reflection.

He's not fast enough to act. Ulysses Thorne tackles Kyran into the bathroom wall, shattering it with his body. Shards of broken tile slice through Kyran's skin as he falls down to the wet ground. Thorne's tail slashes at the bars of neon light above, shattering them and causing the lights to flicker back and forth like strobe lights.

Kyran disappears, staining the marble white floor with heavy drops of blood. Thorne smells the iron and reaches behind him, grabbing the panther by his powerful neck.

"I can smell you," the lizard says, airing his putrid breath onto Kyran's face as he grips harder.

"You and me both," the panther says, shutting his eyes from the nauseating lights.

Kyran leaps again, this time to commotion of the club. His bloody palms slip on the smooth dance floor when he lands on it, shoving irate partygoers aside.

Thorne easily tears through the bathroom wall, grabbing a lynx by her dress to launch her at Kyran. He catches her and teleports into the alley, where she hammers onto any part of his body she can reach, shouting in rapid French.

In the office, the others jump, struggling to see through the rubble below.

Indigo rushes down to the commotion on the dance floor with the others, skipping over stair steps in excitement. They don't want to admit they've missed the danger, but living a sheltered life has given them perspective, and all they want to do is break things and bleed, but not too much, as they're wearing one of their favorite pink suits.

"Did something blow up?" Kamala asks as the waters turn muddy from the settling dust.

As Kamala and Indigo push against the flow of the crowd, Aarden runs toward it, ushering patrons toward the exit. In the office above, Phoenix waits the few minutes it takes for his body to shake off inebriation. He reaches for the swaying door when a set of powerful claws grip the base of his tail to pull him backward.

Aarden rushes back up the spiral staircase, searching for his backpack as Thorne's howls cause his ears to ring in pain. When he reaches the room, he discovers Phoenix pinned to the ground by a figure he's only seen half of before, through a painting on the golden walls of Axton's manor.

***

As Kamala assists Kyran by constructing a crystalline barrier around Thorne, a familiar dance-song blares from the speakers when Indigo spots the gaunt coyote from Ziegler's mountain base through the thinning panic.

"Do you remember me, beautiful?" he says, thick black bandages covering his eyes as he catches the rabbit's sweet lavender scent in the air.

"What did you do to yourself?" Indigo asks, struggling to read the coyote's shattered mind.

The coyote licks his muzzle with his thin tongue.

"You did this to me, bunny. You made me see things so horrifying, I tore my own fucking eyes out, but I can still taste and smell you. I can still see those illusions of yours in my dreams, and I'm going to take immense pleasure in tearing those pretty little purple eyes of yours from your skull."

Indigo catches a rainbow of lights in the reflection of a silvery blade the coyote pulls from his waistband.

He grins before lunging at the rabbit with stunning speed.

Pushed against the bar, Indigo tries to kick him with their powerful legs, but to their surprise, the coyote stops them, grabbing their heels.

"Glory to Dietrich Ziegler, I don't need eyes to see you coming," he says.

Remembering Fletcher's combat training, Indigo throws a jab. But they're once again stopped inches from striking their assailants face. Indigo persists, punching to the beat while dodging the blade slicing the air around them.

Quickly becoming overpowered, Indigo calls out for Phoenix as they run, struggling to fight an enemy they can't manipulate through the fear in his eyes. Indigo kicks shot glasses at the coyote as they leap onto the bar, but he makes quick work of them, reducing them to shards with his sharp blade.

This may not be the enthralling dance Indigo had hoped for.

Kyran disappears, dodging Thorne's poisonous bite by mere inches. Kamala attacks him from the opposite side, but her power is deflected by his metallic scales, launching her backward. Kamala buries her claws into the polished dance floor as she regains her balance, disorientated by the lights and music.

She's about to launch another attack when a blast of green energy breaks apart the glass and iron walls of her office before crashing into a pillar behind them, toppling it over on top of Thorne, rendering him unconscious. A bloodcurdling werewolf cries out as he breaks through the shattered window.

Phoenix leaps behind the beast, shielding his face from the glass shards as he crashes onto a turntable harder than his drunk mind had anticipated, groaning and clutching his sides as he rolls onto the dance-floor.

"Did I get him!?" Aarden's voice calls from above as he struggles with the cannon.

"It's him, it's Zeph!" Phoenix says, rising while conjuring a powerful ball of fire from his fingertips.

"Don't! You'll burn the place down, help Indigo!" Kamala yells as Zephyr's claws carve deep grooves into the stone fountain she hides behind.

Kyran is frozen in place as he cowers behind Kamala's neon pink shield.

"Zephyr, is that you?" He calls out in disbelief. The werewolf shakes the glass from his fur, howling and bearing his fangs before lunging at the panthers.

He breaks through Kamala's shield, burying shards of crystallized energy into the walls behind them. The werewolf nearly swipes at Kyran across his stomach before Phoenix grabs him by the waist in time to pull him away from the razor-like claws.

"Focus!" Phoenix says.

"Nice save," Kamala says, shaking the thought of almost seeing Kyran die the same way their mother did.

On the opposite side of the nightclub, Indigo is thrown against a velvet booth by the coyote, who buries his knife deep into the table.

"You missed me," Indigo says, trying to catch their breath.

"I didn't miss. I just want to get you nice and scared before I kill you," he growls.

Indigo leaps up and grasps at a decorative fencing saber from a display on the wall.

"You're going to have to do a lot more than that to scare me," Indigo teases, "and use equipment much bigger than that little pocketknife of yours."

Steel clangs as Indigo parries their attackers' blade, but the coyote swiftly overpowers the smaller rabbit. A surge of dread rises within Indigo as they begin to see themselves lose this fight.

The coyote lunges at them, aiming directly for their heart when a powerful blast of green energy obliterates him, launching what's left of him through the wall and into the alley outside. Aarden stands wide-eyed before them, the cannon sending smoke into the air.

"I think you killed him!" Indigo yells over the music, relieved.

"What!?" Aarden yells, his blaster sizzling as he cups his ear to listen over the blaring beat.

"What the hell is that!?" Kamala yells, trying her best to contain Zephyr, who conceals himself in the smoke and ash of the pulverized wall.

"It's your adaptation, but better!" Aarden yells, pointing at the metal device wrapped around his arm.

"What the fuck!"Kamala yells before being tackled by Zephyr, who pins her to the ground. Kamala grabs his nose and lower jaw, pushing him away from her as he slobbers on her neck, trying his hardest to bury his teeth into her.

"It's really Zephyr?" Aarden asks Indigo, who stares through the still sizzling hole in the wall.

Phoenix punches at the werewolf, trying to push him off Kamala. Zephyr swipes and launches Phoenix backward, knocking him unconscious when his hard skull meets the harder brick wall behind the bar.

Thorne stirs awake, running toward the unconscious Phoenix, but he's stopped by Indigo, who points the saber at the dragon while looking into his searing scarlet eyes, immediately catching flashes of his pained memories as heartache overwhelms them.

"What did Ziegler turn you into?" Indigo asks, throwing the saber aside and showing Thorne their open palms.

The large lizard fights the magic swimming in his brain, but Indigo eventually breaks through, unlocking memories of a time before the pain and chaos.

Thorne kneels, allowing Indigo to place palms against hands twice as large as theirs as they stare into blood-red eyes, trying hard to find the individual buried underneath the monster.

"You're just like Zephyr. Whatever he's done to you, we can fix it. I know you're still in there somewhere."

Indigo extends their arm, reaching out and touching Thorne's cold face, his rough scales scratching their soft palms. The dragon closes his eyes to better see the memories flooding into him, but the monster heeds the call of an unheard siren, forcing him to back away and escape through the alley, pushing Indigo aside as he scurries back to his master.

"That's more like it!" Aarden says to a retreating Thorne as he shakes Phoenix, who mumbles and stirs as he regains consciousness.

"Indigo!" Kyran yells as he teleports on top of Zephyr, pulling the rabbit from the middle of Thorne's painful memories.

"Move out of the way!" Aarden says, firing up his cannon, bathing the dance floor in green light.

"Don't fire that thing!" Kyran yells through the commotion, "Indigo, do something!"

The rabbit extends their hands, concentrating on the wild emotions swimming in Zephyr's brain.

Kamala gains enough leverage over Zephyr to push him off and roll away. Enraged by Indigo assaulting his mind, the werewolf runs toward the rabbit, pinning them against the wall with his powerful grip.

The werewolf bares his fangs to bite Indigo when he begins sneezing wildly, dropping the rabbit as he claws at his nose. The illusionist looks up to meet Zephyr's eyes, dodging the large claws trying to swipe at them.

"Can you read him?" Kamala asks, clutching her bleeding arm.

"I'm trying!"

Indigo reads something deep inside Zephyr. They push with all their strength, but they can't see through fear that's strangely artificial, as if they're fighting one illusion with another. Zephyr's mind is far too fractured to piece together, like trying to form a face in the reflection of a broken mirror.

Finally, Indigo can sense a single image, distorted in the mania and buried deep inside a damaged soul. Love and longing swells through Indigo, tears falling down their face as they feel a deep longing to escape a painful prison.

"Kamala!" Indigo shouts before losing the connection and fainting.

Zephyr turns to Kamala. He gently presses his head against hers, staring longingly into her, as if gazing up at a clear blue sky when he looks into her eyes. He doesn't hurt her, inching closer until he cowers back, crying out as an invisible pitch in his head tortures him, compelling him to race into the midnight.

Kyran, Kamala and a dizzy Indigo teleport into the cold street after him.

"It is him," Kyran says, turning to Indigo.

The sound of Zephyr running on all fours fades away like their hopes in the night.

"What did you read?" Kamala demands, clutching her burning sides.

"I couldn't help it. It was buried too deep, but I could read parts of him. Kamala, he's too far gone, too broken for me to make sense of anything in his head. It's not words anymore, just feelings. Intense emotions I could feel myself, and I don't think I could handle much more of it if I tried to do that again."

"Don't say that. I can't lose him," she says.

Kyran hugs his sister apprehensively as she sobs into his shoulders.

"I'm sorry, I meant to tell you, but I didn't know when," Kyran says through sharp breaths.

"Tell me what?" Kamala says, pulling from Kyran's embrace.

"About Zephyr. That he's alive, I saw it when we broke into Zenith Genetics."

"I already knew he was alive. I found out a few years ago when I saw him in Ziegler's lab."

"I found out just a few weeks ago," Kyran says, hurt.

"I didn't want to tell you because that's how mom died. Zephyr killed her. It may be possible to pull Zephyr from inside the beast, but he won't be the same. He still killed her," Kamala says, the cool night wind making the blood on her fur run as cold as Thorne's.

"He's always been a killer, just like the rest of us. Just because you kill the right targets, doesn't mean you're not still a killer, that's something we all have to live with," Kyran says.

"Either way, he'll never forgive himself for what he did," Kamala says.

"So, what do you suggest we do, erase his memories?" Indigo asks, removing their broken heels.

Kamala gives them a curious look. "Can you do that?"

"I've never done it before. It may not be possible, and even if I could, we would need to get him back before I can even attempt that. I tried with everything in me to turn him back, but I can't do it, not unless we can weaken him."

Aarden and Phoenix catch up to them, both coughing and heaving as the smoke filling their lungs spills into the narrow alleyways beside the river.

"Are you okay?" Kamala asks, "where's all this smoke coming from?"

"I took care of the place. Torched it, no evidence," Phoenix says proudly.

Kamala's eyes grow wide.

"You fucking idiot! All of my money was in there! That was my nightclub, Phoenix! Who the hell asked you to burn it down!?" She shouts, beating on his chest with closed fists.

Aarden and Phoenix exchange grimaces.

"I told you not to do it!" Aarden yells, the loud music temporarily affecting his hearing.

"If Zephyr was there, Ziegler was nearby," Kyran says.

"Who knows where he could be heading next, but I'm willing to bet he's watching us from somewhere close by right now."

"Or he has been for a while," Kyran warns.

"Quinn," Kamala whispers, running away from the smoke as the others follow her.

Later, when they reach Kamala's home, Quinn is playing a card game on a small circular table they once stole from a café.

"What happened to you guys?" Quinn asks, rushing toward them she turns on the single bulb, shining a light onto faces matted with blood and dust.

"Family reunion," Kamala says, spitting blood onto the floor.

***

Hours later, Phoenix snores loudly on the couch as Indigo nestles themselves in his arms, both of them sleeping soundly under the cover of a warm blanket.

At the other end of the warehouse like space, Quinn mends Aarden's wounds.

"Do you really have no powers or is that just a bluff?" Quinn asks, returning from the sink to bandage Aarden's head.

"I'm just an average red panda, who happens to be kind of a genius at inventing things," Aarden says, the heavy metal cannon nearly splitting the table in half when he leans his arm against it.

"After the life I've lived, I like average. But I don't believe you for a second. There's something there, I can see it in your eyes. You all have these eyes I've never seen before, they're bright, like you're all from the same source."

"I've never met a girl like you before," Aarden says.

"We just met," Quinn laughs.

"Dodge this," Aarden says after a few moments of silence.

"Excuse me?"

"Oh, I killed a guy earlier with my cannon. I should've said dodge this, or something cool like that before I fired, but that was my first time shooting someone. It would've been embarrassing if I said a cool one-liner and then just blew myself up in the process."

"You killed someone?"

"You're right, I did," Aarden says, a sudden look of shock coming across his face when he realizes he had first tried to fire at Zephyr.

In the midst of an inky early morning, Kyran and Kamala have a conversation on the rooftop terrace. The twins look out into the bright city beyond the rusty railing after several hours of catching up.

"What was she like?" Kyran asks, thinking of Soraya Singh.

Kamala thinks, taking small, calculated sips from her tea.

"She reminded me a little of the both of us. Smart like you, but definitely not soft spoken--

"Like you," Kyran says.

"I barely spoke to her."

"She told me she raised us in London, and that it wasn't her choice to give us to Thaddeus. Our adaptation manifested to the point where she couldn't keep us hidden away."

Kyran retracts his claws to pick the dirt from underneath them.

"Well, that's yet another thing these adaptations have taken from us."

"I was so blinded with anger, I didn't see she loved us, and giving us up was the hardest thing she ever had to do. She saved Quinn from being made into one of us, maybe to make up for losing us, and now she's as alone as we are. I can't leave her behind, and I'm not sure she'll want to come with us, but anything's better than this. She deserves peace and quiet."

"Why haven't you gone back yourself?" Kyran asks.

Kamala looks to the horizon for the strength to confront her emotions.

"I tried to kill him, after he killed Singh. I couldn't do it, just like I couldn't tonight. There has to be a way to save whatever's left of him."

"I don't know if it's possible, but I do know we have some time. Ziegler is opening Zenith Genetics back up in London this July. We know he'll be there, and chances are Zephyr will too, and we'll have a plan by then."

"I'm sorry about everything," Kamala says.

"You're not one to apologize," Kyran responds.

"Well, I am now. I don't know what's going to happen after all of this, but it's probably going to be the last time we're all together again. I need to give her some semblance of a normal life before she grows up to resent me. Quinn's no older than Aarden, she turned nineteen on the run. We celebrated her birthday while we were sleeping in a boathouse."

They sit in silent contemplation until Kamala laughs to herself.

"Did you see Indigo in there? They should marry Phoenix already and get it over with," she says.

"They found someone actually, in Las Vegas."

"Of all the things that happened to us today, why does that surprise me the most?" Kamala says.

"What about Aarden, what's he going to do when all this is done?" She asks, thinking about what Aarden said to her about belonging, and his later admission to her that he has no adaptation.

"He deserves what we never had; I was thinking of getting him into a university somewhere. I never got to go. He'd thrive there, and he could use more friends like himself too, ordinary peers."

"I don't think he's fully ordinary, I mean what's with that blaster thing on his arm?"

"Maybe he missed you."

"Well, I missed all of you. Please don't tell Phoenix and Indigo I said that."

As they continue to talk under the lights of a sleeping city, a brilliant aurora materializes, painting the night with turquoise and cyan light that dances across the sky.

"That's Indigo, they don't have too much control of their adaptation when they're asleep," Kyran explains.

Kamala gazes up in awe. "I remember. They haven't done that since we were kids."

Kyran adjusts his glasses, a tear traveling down the glossy fur on his handsome face.

"When they dream, they create these. Back at the manor, I'd go outside and stare at them sometimes with everyone else, and they'll never know it's Indigo dreaming. What's normal to us is incomprehensible to others. What I wouldn't give to be on the other side for once, staring up at something beautiful without understanding just how dangerous it really is.