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Axton Manor, August 2015.

It's late into a stormy summer night when Indigo and Quinn meet each other at the landing of the wide marble staircase from opposite ends of dark, endless hallways.

"I saw someone walking up the driveway from my bedroom window," Quinn says over the lashings of rain on the mansard roof far above them. The way her heavy boots echo like thunder around the foyer tells Indigo she's had no sleep, as they step barefoot onto the icy marble. Moonlight fails to shine through the murky sky and into the glass dome far above them, bathing the usually silvery room in total blackness.

"Did you see them?" Quinn asks Indigo, whose small body, draped only in a set of cobalt blue pajamas, shivers uncontrollably as they maneuver through both physical and emotional cold.

"There's some things you don't need eyes to see," Indigo responds as they race blindly to the front door.

"Shouldn't we call the others?" Quinn asks in her low, monotonous voice, catching up to them as her eyes adjust to the darkness.

"I don't think they're here to cause us any harm, I can read it in their thoughts," Indigo says, clicking open the heavy mahogany door.

Bracing themselves against the midnight torrent, the two strangers step into the circular driveway at the front of the manor as cold droplets of rain drench through their thin clothing and soak through their glossy coats of fur to the skin beneath. In the near distance, obscured by sheets of rain, a panther unfamiliar to Indigo stands before a flooding fountain.

Quinn races forward, embracing Soraya Singh with a smile on her face as Indigo rushes back to the manor to wake the others.

Hours later, long after the storms have passed, Soraya Singh looks out at the forest from the tall windows of the dining room, glaring into a full moon veiled by small patches of silver clouds. She clutches Quinn's hand tightly while Indigo and Kamala sit at the end of the long dining table. The others spill into the room. First Phoenix, who leans against the wall, and then an exhausted Aarden, who was up all night finishing the cannon.

"Well, Soraya, why the sudden change of heart?" Kamala asks, voicing what's surely in the minds of the others.

Singh turns to face her daughter. Under the soft golden glow of the crystal chandelier, Kamala catches a still healing gash across her mother's face, exposing the skin beneath and breaking apart her uniform coat of midnight fur. Her silver hair, still wet from the rain, weighs down heavy over her shoulders, making her appear as if she's drowned.

"Dietrich Ziegler has grown more irrational with each passing day, that's why. Something within him is breaking and it's only a matter of time before he acts and walks through those very doors. He's convinced Zenith Genetics is rightfully his, and that he's travelled through time. At first, I didn't want to believe it, but all the evidence suggests he isn't lying."

"Is that why you're here, for answers?" Kamala growls, blaming herself for thinking her decision was motivated by care rather than curiosity.

Singh's gaze breaks, tired of trying to see the forest for the trees. "No, I'm here for Quinn. If what you're saying is true, then he'll stop at nothing until he owns this power," Singh says, avoiding Aarden's glare from across the room.

"The sooner I can hide you, the safer you'll be. Ziegler's victory is inevitable, all we can do now is escape, and hope that when he finds us, we'll be of use enough for him to spare us. Please, you have to understand, it's what's best for you. Not just Quinn, all of you."

"Since when do you get to choose what's best for us? Thaddeus will be down momentarily. He'll make that choice for us, if there's even one to make," Kyran says from the camouflage of darkness in the dark bronze room. Identical eyes glare into one another.

"You look exactly like your father," Singh says. Kyran nods nervously, feigning a smile as he teleports by Phoenix's side.

"Soraya?" Thaddeus asks in disbelief, his gruff voice echoing through the room. Guided by Marina Fletcher, the lion approaches her with cautious optimism, recalling that the last time he saw her she was practically sharpening the claws she was going to lunge into his back.

"Thaddeus, you know I wouldn't step foot here unless it was urgent. Dietrich is getting desperate. It won't be long before he's here for the boy, and the crystal blossom," Singh says, pointing at Aarden, who steps awkwardly into the shadows as all of the eyes in the room focus on him.

Thaddeus weighs the news, stunned to see the entire manor awake before him.

"He may make it in, but he's not making it back out alive," the older lion assures her, gesturing for her to take a seat.

"You don't understand. He won't stop until he has the boy. He's far too gone to listen to reason. This newly discovered possibility, this power, it's far too tempting for a tyrant like him. What he'll bring, it will fall on you Thaddeus. You should've given him the boy when you had the chance, he'll kill us all."

"How do I know you're telling the truth?" Thaddeus asks apprehensively. "The last time I saw you, you handed over my work to Dietrich Ziegler. You helped him try to make more Zenith's without my knowledge. It was because of you that he found the location of the boy. Elio Xavier is dead because of your actions, why should I trust a single thing you have to say?"

A flood of feeling explodes within Aarden, making the room spin as his face grows hot and his feet run cold. At his side, Indigo pulls on their ears from the sudden rush of blood as they pick up Aarden's rage.

"It shouldn't have been like this, but he has the right to know," Thaddeus says. The red panda says nothing, shivering with rage as if his body were doused in the cold rain outside.

Singh turns tearfully to Aarden.

"Aarden, I never intended for that to happen. Dietrich found out about Quinn. I couldn't keep her hidden forever, she was my secret."

She turns to Thaddeus, searching for absolution in his eyes.

"Thaddeus, you can't blame me for keeping secrets. You and the Kuipers did the same with Aarden. The truth was hidden in the notes I stole. It wasn't my intention, but he learned of the boy, and where Elio was hiding him. He threatened the life of my daughter if I didn't present him with information. You have to believe me when I say that I play no part in this war, and I don't intend to fight him. I just came to warn you, and to get my children away from here," Singh says.

Quinn holds Aarden's hand as a pain he's learned to forget floods back into him. After years of wondering, he finally has answers, but all it does is make him feel empty inside.

"You're responsible for Aarden losing everything?" Quinn asks, still feeling like she's talking to a ghost rather than her actual mother. "I can't go with you. We can't just leave them behind, especially after what you did! This was all your fault!"

"Quinn, please," Singh pleads.

"We can't, not until we save Zephyr first," Quinn says, remembering the werewolf who now listens intensely to the sounds above him from his cell in the basement.

The panther steps closer, but Quinn retreats into the shadows.

"We're not leaving here until we save him! Then I can go with you. You may not be the mother I knew, but you at least have the chance to change, the one I knew doesn't have that choice anymore."

"She's right, they're as close as we'll ever get," Phoenix says, glancing over at an Indigo who's oblivious to life outside the manor and a Kyran whose back is free of scars, having never known the pain of Phoenix's claws tearing into him.

"Is he really worth saving?" Singh asks.

Aarden speaks up.

"Ulysses Thorne killed the closest thing I've ever had to a father, but I don't blame him. It was Ziegler who made him do it. Ziegler had to kill Zephyr and Thorne first before he could manipulate them to kill the ones we love. I may not feel it in my heart at this moment, but I know that one day, I'll forgive you for what you unintentionally did, but I also understand this is beyond just me."

Tears mist the older panther's amber eyes.

"I can't begin to tell you how sorry I am, to all of you. I know what I've done is unforgivable, and the part I've played in your creation is a sin I'll pay for dearly, but all I want is for you to be safe."

"You'll come with me, Quinn?"

Quinn is torn, afraid of letting go of Aarden's hand.

"We're living someone else's life, we can't just go back and pretend everything is back to normal."

"We can at least try!" Singh says, afraid of losing what little she has left.

"I agree, but not until we rescue Zephyr first. We owe them that. I at least understand that," Quinn says.

Singh glances out at something beyond the trees through the tall windows.

"You're right. How soon can this be done?"

"I can down some more coffee and finish the last adjustments by this afternoon," Aarden says, piecing together what he has left to do. "It would be our only shot for now though. We made a backup cannon, but it's still at Zenith Genetics, unfinished."

"We don't have that much time," Singh says before Aarden interrupts her.

"Don't talk to me about time. If he's after me then it's my tail on the line. I'll get this done, then you can go back to your nice normal life," Aarden says, anger in his voice as he walks past Quinn.

He's not angry at her about the choice she'll inevitably make, he's angry at himself for knowing he'd make the exact same choice if he were her.

***

The small town at the base of the hill the manor stands on has had its fair share of attention in the last several decades, transforming from a nameless farming community to a capital of media frenzy the moment a large lion strode into town with a team of architects and bottomless bank accounts.

The residents of Iris Ridge never heard of Zenith Genetics or Thaddeus Axton, but eventually, the frenzy that consumed the city made their names inescapable. At the height of the Zenith's popularity, thousands of fanatics occupied the town's diners and hotels, each eager at a glimpse of the Lycan, the Shadow, the Lotus, the Inferno or the Enigma as they were known at the time.

Now, Iris Ridge stands as a ghost town underneath the crushing shadow of Axton's manor.

On a balmy summer night, a menacing stranger strides into town. A tall wolf with a skeletal frame stalks the darkness, his searing scarlet eyes fixated on the dull golden glow of the distant manor.

The last time he peered helplessly up at the marble and glass forest, he lost his son. Accepting he will never have Zephyr, Dietrich Ziegler paces up the dirt path leading to the manor with one goal in mind, turning back the clock to step back in time, to before everything fell apart, for a second chance at destiny.

But it's halfway up the path when his ears pick up a hissing from deep within the black forest.

***

The next day, Kamala glances at the framed photographs on the curved walls of the manors trophy room. The Zenith, mainly as a team of four, stand before world leaders and so called royalty, smiling brightly while wearing uniforms distinguished by stripes of their signature color.

Kamala is unsure if she's repressed these memories or if they belong to someone else, but none of it makes much sense to her. Gradually, the others spill into the room. Then, they each face the large rounded archway leading to a sparkling glass hall before opening up to the great glass canopy of the colossal conservatory.

Kamala navigates through the super-sensory as waves of Zenith energy, visible only to her, ripple through the artificial tropical air, magnetically pulling her toward the oak tree at the center, as if liquid mercury flows through her veins.

"It's there, deep inside," Kamala says, the subtle space between electromagnetic waves decreasing until it becomes a steady hum at her fingertips.

"How far within?" Kyran asks nervously, his hands tucked deep into the pockets of his blazer as he envisions the space beyond the massive oak.

"Right at the base, near the roots," Kamala says, the power reverberating so deeply, she can feel it in her bones.

The others climb up the spiral staircases to the steel catwalk above the jungle, leaving Kamala and Kyran alone on the artificial jungle floor.

Kyran presses sweaty palms on the wet, damp earth, mimicking the starting position of a sprinter. He closes his eyes, visualizing himself in the small patch of hydrangeas at the other end of the wide trunk.

He sprints as fast as he can toward the sturdy oak and leaps without thinking, extending his hands out to feel something solid amongst the intangible. His body rolls as he reappears, splashing into a shallow pond while clutching a small collection of glowing gems under his arm.

He shakes the water from his long hair. Along the catwalk built high above the expansive jungle garden, the four others cheer, observing everything from a distance.

"How do we break a piece off?" Kyran gasps through gaps in his sharp teeth as the power overwhelms him, sending surges of electricity-like energy through him.

"You don't remember?" Kamala asks before remembering herself what happened to the Kyran who helped her solve this dilemma once before. Kamala reaches for the Zenith Crown, pushing against the energy to silence the chaotic buzzing filling the air. Her eyes glowing, she twists until a heavy emerald-like crystal breaks cleanly off the petal like formation. The limitless energy within it vibrates, ebbing until its rendered motionless by Kamala's flow. The ten other crystals shift back into their flower-like configuration, finding balance within itself.

"One piece is already missing," Kyran observes, finally able to get a good look at it.

Aarden races down the stairs to the faux jungle floor. He hands the cannon to Kamala, who attaches it to her arm magnetically.

"Here's to no more surprises," Kamala says as she harmonizes with the power of the Zenith before placing it into Aarden's cannon through a latch on the side.

Instantly, the cannon roars to life, humming and bathing their humid surroundings in jade light.

"It's armed," Aarden says beside her.

"Are you all set on the plan?" Kyran asks Kamala, searching for understanding in her gaze.

"It sounds simple to me. As soon as you teleport in with Zephyr, I shoot. Indigo does the rest," Kamala says with a confident smile masking fear she knows the werewolf will sense in the sticky air.

"Correct, and try not to aim for his heart. Remember, once he's hit, he's going to go on a rampage. We'll try our best to hold him back; I'll bring Indigo down to finish it as he begins to turn."

"If that doesn't work?" Kamala asks her twin, the skin underneath her pink coat burning.

"We keep trying until something does," Kyran says before teleporting away.

Only the crooning of the Zenith Crown fills the silent air before Aarden speaks.

"They should be back any second. He's going to be confused for a moment, but we only have one good shot at him before we need to recharge," Aarden tells her.

"Thank you, for giving us a second chance," Kamala says over the soft humming of insects and the rush of an artificial waterfall.

"You can thank me when this is all over."

Neither dares to speak a word again, the two frozen before a rugged tree standing still like a sentinel watching over the newly planted flowers in the center of the conservatory.

Aarden's heart beats heavily in his ears. Then, through a flurry of black storm clouds, Zephyr's ruby eyes burn like flares in a midnight sky. The smoke rises in the hot air, obscuring the vision of the three others clinging to the rails of the catwalk.

"Was that the signal?" Quinn asks, running through the darkness to escape the cloud of smoke.

"I haven't heard the cannon fire yet!" Indigo says, giving chase as Phoenix runs in the opposite direction.

The werewolf howls as the smoke dissipates, charging toward them, desperate to dig his teeth into something living after weeks of agonizing isolation.

"I hope this works," Kamala says as she launches a beacon of powerful energy at the werewolf, striking him squarely across the chest, launching him backward until his momentum is stopped by the body of the rugged tree.

Kamala steadies herself, waiting for the cannon to load another shot when Phoenix and Aarden push all their weight down on Zephyr's arms, pinning him to the ground as he snarls and bites at them.

"He's starting to turn!" Phoenix says as he spits away at the strands of slobber landing on his muzzle.

Aarden shifts, pressing what little weight he has on the werewolves massive hind legs. Revulsion runs up Aarden's spine like electricity as tendons snap, muscles tear, and bones break under Zephyr's thick coat of fur as his body violently twists back to a form it hasn't known in years.

Kyran reappears, clutching Indigo by their back to bring them forward before disappearing to aid Aarden in holding down Zephyr's massive leg as the red panda is flailed around by the force of the werewolf's kicks.

"He's resisting pretty strongly," Indigo says, pulling back as Zephyr lunges forward to try and tear their throat out.

"We only have a few more minutes before he turns back," Kyran warns, pushing all his weight down on Zephyr's leg.

Kamala lets go, holding her arms up until the air ripples like the silvery surface of a lake.

"I have an idea!"

"The thing we did in Thaddeus's study?" Indigo asks, reading her mind.

"Can you do it?" Kamala asks, placing her hand on Indigo's shoulders to protect them behind a shield.

"I can give it a try," they say, unafraid as their no longer peering into the eyes of a werewolf, but of a friend.

Indigo's mind vanishes into the ethereal, their body falling backward onto a field of white flowers, their eyes staring sightlessly up into the sky beyond the glass domed ceiling.

"What happened to them?" Phoenix asks, Zephyr relaxing as Indigo stirs in the field of flowers.

"I'm sure they'll be back," Kamala says in a voice that doesn't sound assured.

Zephyr lays gently as if asleep by the base of the tree, his red eyes staring blankly into Kamala's. She tries to hold in her tears as she glances at a face she doesn't recognize, one that looks more like Ziegler's with scars running up and down his gaunt muzzle.

"Now we wait," Phoenix says, rushing to check on Indigo, seeing blue magic swirl in the purple seas of their irises.

***

When Indigo wakes up, they're laying down on a puffy bed of green moss by the bank of a roaring river. The sun above them is bright against their eyes, but they feel numb to anything else. Beyond that, they can't see much else of anything, but Indigo isn't worried about what they can't see, they're worried about what they're unable to hear. For the first time in their life, everything is completely silent within their head.

"Zephyr?" Indigo calls out, but their dulcet voice doesn't seem to travel far through the thick fog surrounding them in the cloud forest.

Indigo's ears twitch toward the direction of the sound of snapping twigs. They wander, their boots the only sound accompanying the rush of the river.

"I'm getting tired of forests," Indigo says to themselves as they leap over fallen trees that have long since been reclaimed by the emerald moss. "I guess the inside of Zephyr's mind is as wild and untamed as he is."

Indigo concentrates until their ears tell them the faint whimpering is coming from somewhere within a dense undergrowth of sword ferns.

They tread through the unseen until they see a massive shadow lurking in the clearing fog. Zephyr sobs, hunched over an even larger beast, the werewolf version of himself.

Zephyr's ruby eyes gaze into the fading life inside eyes identical to his own. He presses his hands down through the dense coat of blood-soaked fur on the wounded beast, trying his best to keep his blood from spilling into a stream that dyes the river red when they cross.

"Help me, he's dying," Zephyr pleads, streaks of warm blood camouflaging in his crimson hair as he runs his hands through it to keep it out of his worried eyes.

Indigo pushes through the ferns to kneel beside their brother, resting their head on his shoulder. He looks exactly as they remember him, his body still lean but muscular, unlike the skeletal Zephyr whose eyes he peered into.

"You need to let him die," Indigo says, clutching Zephyr's shaking hands.

"I won't. He is me." The wolf pleads, glancing around desperately for anything he can use to carry a werewolf too heavy for even him.

"He's consumed you and made you hurt those you love. You wouldn't want to hurt me, or Phoenix, or Kyran, or Kamala, would you?"

Zephyr shakes his large head back and forth as the werewolves breathing grows calmer.

"Where's Kamala?"

"She's beyond the wilderness, but you have to follow me back if you want to see her."

The werewolf reaches for Zephyr with his long black claws, his adaptation reducing his last words to primal growls, but Indigo understands him through the unspoken language of emotion.

"He wants to give you something. A warning," Indigo says, reading scrambled words inside a tumultuous mind.

Zephyr takes an orange colored gem from the beast's limp hand as his massive body begins its journey of reclamation by the mossy forest floor in the field of fallen trees. Zephyr opens his own hand to reveal a bright red gem. He holds them both up to the rays of sunlight breaking through the canopy, balanced for the first time.

"I'm ready to see them," Zephyr says, taking Indigo's hand and walking toward a bright light beyond the blinding white.

***

Zephyr's eyes open to the sight of a tranquil orange sunset. He pushes against the smooth stone floor to sit up, but his emaciated body crumbles with the weight placed on his atrophying muscles.

Kyran, Kamala, Phoenix, Indigo and two strangers surround him, observing him closely through glistening eyes.

"How did we make it back?" Zephyr asks, his mouth tasting of blood.

They glance nervously at one another, too consumed with the improbability of their plan to ever think about what comes after.

Kamala falls to her knees and wraps her arms around Zephyr to hug him tightly, sobbing into his unkempt crimson hair.

Zephyr meets the serene eyes of a violet raccoon who stares at him with a sorrow and rage he's painfully familiar with.

"Did I hurt you?" Zephyr asks, his voice breaking from disuse.

Quinn hikes down to the serene shores of the dark lake, finally taking the time to mourn her mother as the other's surround a loved one they never thought they would see again.

Zephyr's quivering feet are planted firmly on warm soil as Phoenix picks him up, putting his arm on his shoulder to help walk him back to the manor through the archway leading to the large trophy room. Aarden flanks Zephyr's other side, doing his best to help, knowing Phoenix is carrying all the weight himself.

"You must be Aarden. By the looks of you, you're a little older than Fletcher said you would be," Zephyr says, his words making Aarden's heart ache.

"What happened to the garden?" Zephyr asks as they cut through a hallway with views to the courtyard outside. The more they walk, the more unfamiliar everything becomes to the wolf.

"How long has it been?" Zephyr asks, the little moisture left in his body slipping through his eyes as he peers out into a late summer, expecting to wake to a cold winter.

***

Later that night, Aarden moves his belongings back into the basement one box at a time. He hasn't slept in days, but even if he laid in his bed and tried, he still couldn't. His mind is racing too quickly to rest.

Some time later, the red panda yawns, a warm mug in his hand as he returns to his workstation. Then, through the shadows, a pair of ruby red eyes embedded in a field of shimmery silver scales reflect his frightened expression back to him.

"I remember everything," Ulysses Thorne tells him with his guttural howl of a voice.

Thorne pulls Aarden into a suffocating embrace, his shadowy red eyes desperately searching for a face that recognizes him as something other than the monster he appears to be.

"Thorne! How did you survive?" Aarden asks, shocked to still be shocked after all he's experienced.

"I kept the rabbit safe, stayed with him until I woke up," Thorne says, each rasping word sounding from him through pained effort.

"What did Ziegler do to you?" Aarden asks, his paw pads cold as he presses them on Thorne's rough snout.

A faint sound comes from the corner of the room. The lizard pushes Aarden behind him as a booming voice calls out his name.

"You tricked me?" Aarden asks, his ears dropping down against his hair, too hurt and afraid to scream for help.

"You promised you wouldn't hurt him," Thorne rasps.

"So, you did survive," Ziegler says, studying Thorne over, desperately searching for a face that recognizes him as the monster he is.

A familiar green glow fills the space between them as Ziegler extends the battered cannon wrapped around his arm.

"It's so nice to see you again, Aarden and I do mean that genuinely. I was afraid I was never going to be able to thank you for this marvelous invention," Ziegler says, holding the cannon to the light. "This, Zeitkanone."

"Please don't hurt him," Aarden says, aiming the latest iteration of his cannon directly at Ziegler's heart.

"I'm not going to hurt Thorne. He was once a dear friend to me. I'm just here to do what I've should've done a while ago. It's clear from our last encounter that your adaptation emerges from a dark place, one I've seen only once before," Ziegler says, his voice just louder than a whisper.

"I see you've made some improvements to your Zeitkanone."

"The what?"

"Time. Zeit! The weapon you hold in your hands, and not just when you hold the cannon!" Ziegler shouts, causing Aarden to jump in place.

The marred timber wolf pulls a blade from a jacket pocket full of menacing medical instruments.

"Zenith 1 exhibited the early signs of his lycanthropy by the time he was five years old. Zeniths 2 and 3 were causing quite a commotion for Soraya Singh while they were still infants with uncontrollable adaptations, and we spent the early part of the nineties researching and developing incombustible clothing for Zenith 4. Every one of your adoptive siblings proved to us that harnessing the power of the Zenith Crown flowing in your veins was instinctual, there wasn't much we had to do except nurture it. This was the case for all of them except Zenith 5. They were a different story altogether. Regardless, it's the classic instinctive choice between fight or flight. But the choice is an illusion, as the endgame is always just survival, and death can come quickly, regardless of the choice made. Well, Zenith 6. The choice is now yours to make. Let's see if we can make that adaptation appear through fear."

Ziegler tosses apart anything standing between himself and Aarden, charging toward him with his lanky body. Thorne pushes Aarden aside, his loud hissing forcing him to place his hands over his ears, causing him to hit the side of his head with the heavy steel cannon.

Thorne slashes, slicing fresh cuts into the wolfs tough skin.

"Step aside, Ulysses!" Ziegler growls, clutching the side of his bleeding face as Aarden searches for something to defend himself with through the stars in his vision.

But the dragon doesn't relent, causing Ziegler to roar as he clamps his powerful jaws shut on his shoulders, spinning and pulling to tear off any part of him he can.

"Stop, you're going to kill him!" Aarden pleads, pulling on Thorne's tattered lab coat, but the lizard instinctively swipes at him with his powerful tail, throwing the red panda into a glass cabinet housing heavy lab equipment that slices into his back and arms as it breaks with his body.

"Fight me as if your life depends on it! Feel the adrenaline rushing within you!" Ziegler says, ramming Thorne's snout with his thick skull to release his grip, setting his sights on Aarden.

Searing pain rushes through Aarden. He concentrates past the chaos around him, trying with everything within him to form the shards of shattered glass back together by bending the flow of time backwards. But like the blood pooling around him on the marble floor, time only rushes forward.

"Fight for your own survival!" Ziegler's voice rings in his whirling head as his shadow looms over him.

"I can't."

"Then of what use are you to me?"

Aarden shouts through an agonizing concoction of frustration and confusion, trying to crawl away, but the palms of his hands slide on his own glistening crimson blood, slipping him into unconsciousness. The last thing Aarden hears is Thorne being overpowered by the faceless shadows of a wolf who haunts his nightmares.

***

Earlier that same night, several floors above the basement lab, Kamala sits on a small bench at the end of the hall by their original bedrooms, a window decorated with stained glass flowers propped open to allow the summer breeze to spill in. Unable to sleep, she stares out at the mass of trees before her, details gradually fading into focus with the approaching dawn as the sounds of Zephyr thrashing through nightmares in his bedroom fill the air. She wipes her tears away, accepting that she's unable to help him when a voice calls from the end of the hall, startling her.

"I hope you've had sufficient rest," Kyran says through his best attempt at a welcoming smile.

"I couldn't sleep," Kamala admits, turning toward him.

"He'll survive the night," Kyran reassures her, the sound of Zephyr groaning traveling down the hall.

"What if he's not the same?" Kamala asks nervously.

Kyran searches for something to say, concentrating on the doors before him.

"I thought you'd be used to that by now. From what I understand, none of us are the same."

"Do you think Zephyr will handle our decisions to leave well?" Kamala asks.

"I don't see why not. We've been heading toward that for years now. It's about time we go our separate ways. I won't take it personally."

"Even if it means Zephyr coming with me, if he chooses to?"

Kyran joins her on the ledge, remembering a time where they could both easily fit on it with room to spare.

"We've talked about this before, and I won't apologize. I'll do whatever it takes to maintain the integrity of this team. Personal feelings compromise the mission. However, if we survive this, I think we've earned the right to personal feelings, and I hope the best for the both of you."

"That may be the sweetest thing you've ever said to me, and I hope you figure out where it is you want to go."

"I'm perfectly fine where I am now," Kyran says, his concentration on the doors unbroken.

The twins stand in silence before the sudden sound of shattering glass startles them.

"What was that?" Kamala asks, the hall filling with bright pink light.

"The basement!" Kyran says, grabbing her hand and teleporting her below to the grisly sight of Aarden laying face down in a pool of blood glowing black in Kamala's pink light.

Kyran kneels down and shakes the red panda, who stirs feebly, groaning in a dream-like agony.

"He's alive, but he's bleeding out. What happened to him?" Kyran asks, running his fingertips over the gashes on his back, patches of cream and rust fur jutting from between torn green satin.

Kamala steps forward, only able to illuminate the space before her a few feet at a time. Then, leaping from the absolute darkness, a lizard collapses before her, the last of his strength fading as cold blood spills at her feet.

Her shout stifled, Kamala's instinct's have her launch an attack at the other set of eyes stalking from the darkness. Her energy is countered by an identical blast of green light tearing apart a hole in the wall of the basement lab, bathing the space with dust and moonlight.

Dietrich Ziegler steps into the silvery light, glaring down at the twins.

"Hello Kyran, Kamala."

"What are you doing here?" Kamala says, aiming directly at his heart.

"I wouldn't worry about that if I were you. What's important is that I prevented this beast from slaying your friend here. He needs immediate medical attention or he'll die. Now step aside and allow me to help, or are you too caught up into the past to save a life?"