You come- late, but you come.

You're thunderous upon the sand, drawn by a deep and sickening sense of wrongness, by a need to go and go now. Not for the first time you wish you had wings- it is the sinking and shifting of sand that has kept you from getting here faster, the unsteadiness (has it always been so unsteady?) of your home that threatens to prevent you from averting this tragedy. But you aren't hindered, you don't stop, and your hooves beat heavily, fighting against fear, almost as loud as your heart in your chest.

You're late, but you're not too late.

That feeling in your gut gets worse as you take in the scene. Rage and pain flash through your sunbeam eyes as you soak it in. Your last few interactions with your Ma have been... less than positive, but as you look from the sobbing Iskra to your raging mother, Astaraot perched bravely between the pair, you realize this is the worst. The tipping point, the boiling over - you feared this moment as your mother devolved, her sanity slipping, the bright moments of happiness you used to take for granted as a child growing fewer and further between. When did she become this angry shell, this unrecognizable shade of the mother you'd so adored? Was it Gaucho's death? Did he really mean so much to her - more, even, than Iskra, her youngest?

Did he mean so much more to her than you?

"STEP AWAY, MA!"

In an instant you are there, involved, a small speck of black and blue and lightning acting as bulwark to the rising tide of Ampere's electric form. You may be standing near your Ma, but you haven't taken her side. Your body is a growled, silent threat, your eyes and voice constrained with all the furious pain of a betrayed child (why are you doing this, please just stop, please can't things be how they were?) - you have never been this angry, this disillusioned, this betrayed. You entire body is shaking with wrath.

Your goal is to stand above the creature, to move your mother away from it- and you will use force, if necessary.  "This is Iskra's companion," you somehow manage to both bellow and hiss, "And you will not touch it, because YOU abandoned him, and he deserves something that will love him- because you're a fucking shit Ma these days!"

Then your voice lowers, your ears pinned back, and you take another step.
"If you hurt Sparky any more, Ma, I swear on the Sun I'll...." kill you, you want to say, but you don't. You can't. You love your Ma, and you will always love your Ma. You need her. She's... she's Ma, even if maybe she isn't, anymore.

But you glance back at Iskra, and you know it doesn't matter. Because you may need your Ma, but Sparky needs you. And you're not going to go away again.

"I'll take him. I'll take him away from you, and you will never, ever see us again."

How prophetic your words would prove to be.