Then, just like that, it became too quiet. The fire that burned in her wind spread into her bones and ignited the mare, setting her to her feet in a whirl of blue and black that spun from the ground like an inverted tornado. "Zèklè!" she shouted, all feathers stuck on their very ends as she scrambled closer to the body that was already so close, yet so distant. "ZERO!?" she thundered, a demand that stormed from her throat with such intensity it rasped in the wake of it.

In her frenzy she struggled to understand the lump beneath the dead flesh of the god was her child. It was just a remnant of war - is that all he is now she wondered hysterically, quickly jumping to the worst conclusions.
Yet how could she not? Her little lightning, not just young, not just untrained, but so frail in this cruel world. How could he fly like all of the rest of them, with the way that he was? How could he fight, when he was still her boy and laughing was his best trait? How could he, the light in her world, grow dim like this?

He stirred, and it appeared as little more than stripes jiggling around. Her breath hitched, caught somewhere between a sob and a silent moan of despair. Eagerly she reached down for the tiger skin and jerked it back between her teeth, its mass flopping back against her side, slung across her back like some grotesque sash. Some of Isopia's rocks were due to be disturbed by it, likely to tumble around and roll free, but she paid them no mind, interested only in the fallen boy, in the fact that he was moving, breathing, talking.

Then he was there too, kneeling, holding, rescuing mother and son in one fell swoop.
Ampere swayed on her feet, openly sobbing now, whether from grief or relief or stress or love or who the fuck knew, but it was all just coming from her eyes, pushed there from her heart which was already over saturated with it all. Weak-kneed she teetered, dimly aware of Gaucho's fire actually causing a sensation of feeling within her. He had always stirred things, but not like this. As she wobbled, her hoof knocked against one of the heated rocks. She seemed to pause at it, distracted by the sensation and the implication. Like a drunkard her head swung around, muzzle reaching down to touch it, though one blue eyes was still locked firmly on her boy.

She wanted to touch him, wanted to reach her muzzle out to him and reassure herself that he was real, that he was alive, but she trusted Gaucho implicitly. Besides, there was one feeling she hadn't tapped into yet, though she badly wanted to.

Zero would get a taste of it, he more than deserved it, now that he was still alive (please gods). Now wasn't the time though, not when there was a different target.

Ampere's head lifted, blue gaze bleary as she blinked away drying tears. She stared at the girl that lingered awkwardly around her family, at the girl she distinctly remembered being alongside her son. The one that made the rock she kicked - the same one that made the stairway to hell. "You," Ampere hissed after a moment of blankly staring at the familiar raven-mare. In this moment all comradery was wiped from her memory, replaced only with the looping image of such treachery she'd witnessed.

"YOU!" she accused again, finding that inner steel and leaning on it until it bled into her eyes, hard and cold and pale; nothing like the vibrant neon she normally bore. "WHAT THE FUCK WERE YOU THINKING!?" she spat, words easily meant for her child, even herself. She directed them at Isopia instead though, because it was easier. "HE'S JUST A FUCKING CHILD HE CAN'T FIGHT WITH YOU, YOU, YOU CARELESS, IGNORANT, ASS!" Around them sparks began to erupt to life, the blue light dancing up from the decaying plant matter that riddled this land. It responded to the overwhelming emotion that swayed the electric mare, spitting and snarling into existence like some physical manifestation of her wrath. "HE COULD HAVE DIED, BECAUSE OF YOU!" she took a threatening step towards the girl, teeth clipping the air following her words. With the motion her head jerked sideways and up, revealing mostly just the lightning pattern of the left side of her face. The movement jarred her mane, sending it flipping against her nape and across her eyes, making her as wild as she felt.

Normally, Mesec had a habit of blaming himself when he wasn’t actually at fault but this time he really was. It had been after he was injured that Zero had decided to take on the tiger. But Mesec had been too slow to stop him and he had only been able to watch, horrified, as the colt was injured. Icy hands gripped his stomach and his heart. He was useless to help, the healing magic that could take care of his side forgotten because it was useless to help who he really wanted to. The battle with the tiger was forgotten - the Earth God and Helovians alike banding together to defeat it like they had with the previous monsters.

He lost track of Zero in the chaos but as the crowd began to clear away, there he was - lying unconscious. Little Earth was there, and Gaucho was moving forward - covering the colt with his great wings. Perhaps he had healing powers? Whatever was going on, there was no question on whether he would be going over to see whether Zero was okay, to help if there was any way that he possibly could. Not that he was overly helpful, of course, his magic could only heal his own wounds and they were far from his first priority.

Wincing as his wings folded against his burned side, Mesec moved to stand near Isopia - he would have moved toward Gaucho to check on the colt except a burst of yelling was starting him. Ampere was there, sparking dangerously, and venting her frustration on Isopia. Lucius, having ensured that Najya was safe, swooped overhead to keep an eye on the situation. He immediately favoured Isopia in the fight, having never quite warmed up to the lightning mare, but Mesec’s alliances were not so easily determined. He felt protective of Little Earth, however much she towered over him now, and the violent sparks that were surrounding her worried him. He’d step in in defense of the other demigod if it came to it but how was he supposed to step in front of a mother defending her child. “Ampere.” His voice was calm, concerned, his entire focus on her - adding to the yelling wouldn't help the situation but she needed to calm down. Or, if she needed someone to attack, better him than Isopia.

Ampere was constantly berated for her tendency to fly off the handle. Be controlled so many spoke to her in their own way, be rational! By the gods she tried too, she truly did, but sometimes though, she didn't care. Sometimes, she searched for that heat that started in her gut and radiated out into every little fiber of her being. Because sometimes the world needed a firm kick in the teeth, and whenever Ampere waited for someone else to cock a leg, it never came.

Maybe that was the part she failed at; thinking that a fight could resolve anything. If she thought any different though, could she be any good at her job? Would her job even be necessary? The fact of the matter was life was a fight. A fight every damn minute of every damn day just to be alive - so how could everyone accuse Ampere so freely when she put her fists up? Especially when a life was on the line?

No.
She would not say sorry this time. She would not stand and smile like this shit was fine. Somebody deserved to be in deep for this gross miscalculation of her son's safety and capabilities. She was part of that somebody, and he was too (because he wasn't bonded for fuck's sake, he could make his own decisions without blaming them on her), and that might have been all that it was if he hadn't run up some fancy stone stairs that appeared to be made just. for. him.

So Ampere didn't hear the calm way the moonlit man spoke to her, a voice that begged her to put her fists down when they were still tightening at her sides, or at least, she didn't listen. A single eye turned to him then back, noting her starlight trying to guide her out of a storm, but she'd willingly flown into this one and she didn't need his sterling guidance right now (and he should be thankful she wasn't aware he'd practically told her son to fight alongside him too). As it was she barely heard the piteous cries of her wounded son, but only because they sounded like another plea for sanity, but the blue mare was already there. She was acutely aware of everything she did and said, and she purposefully selected this feeling among all the rest, because it was deserved.

Her forgiveness could have been earned too, if Isopia had held any ounce of remorse for her oversight. Ampere understood mistakes, and even if she was quick to anger, she was just as fast to love. What she couldn't tolerate however, was the firm stare Isopia returned her while her body literally bled away into the ground, like a coward trying to hide. That alone would have made Ampere seethe (and she did), but the things Isopia said. The accusations and the implications.

Time to swing.

She would have, right then and there too. She had a multitude of options - the sparks already dancing nearby, the knives on her back, her own teeth to rip into the fucking smug expression she bore. Yet she didn't. She couldn't. Not with him.

At each of Zèklè's cries for her, an ear had flicked back, until both were listening, but unable to hear as they dipped to her neck following the venom Isopia dared to secrete. It was only his physical touch that broke her from the bone smashing fight she was about to fling herself wholeheartedly into. There he was, standing in front of her, pushed up against her as weariness still stole what crumbs of strength he managed to gather every dawn. She broke, moving not towards Isopia, but instead to embrace her boy as he stammered apologies and self blames. Her neck leaned down to wrap around him and tug him closer, holding him right against her chest while her wings extended to cradle him away from all the cruel realities of the world (and maybe even the truths of herself). She ached with a soul-crushing love for him, one that was so much more pronounced following this terrifying moment where he could have been lost forever

"oh little lightning, my little lightning...why, why, why...." she murmured gently to him as her eyes shut off the stupid girl and she nestled her nose in the fray of his mane. Light flooded them both (Gaucho), so warm and inviting, and silently she thanked the Sun with all her might for saving her their boy.

She still heard, like a faded echo, as Isopia continued and Gaucho defended - if she'd had any love to spare at the moment she would have given it to him, but for the time being her heart was nestled firmly and wholly in the little pair of orange eyes, in the single wing, in the smile she'd almost seen go out and been helpless to rescue. "little lightning," she continued to whisper, gasping for breath around the urge to sob once more. "Are you hurt?"

Maybe if Ampere had the ability to heal she would have reacted differently whens he found the near-corpse of her son, but she was only capable of ass kicking and that was the route she walked down. Gaucho could do both, and for that she'd be eternally grateful, but she couldn't just fix things. Ampere had to force change into what was right, what was better, what was just. Zèklè was alive though, he was alive... and that was what mattered, for now.

Isopia just continued to talk though.

With an absolute slowness that betrayed the quickened tempo of Ampere's heartbeat and rapid exchange of feelings, Ampere's head lifted. From beneath black lashes weighed heavy with grief and joy and outrage, the Mother of Companions, the mother of Zèklè, poured the blue of her vision at the raven girl once more. Of all the myriad of things she wished to say, her lips managed only this.

"Leave.
Now.
Or I will show you a justified emotional outburst."

Mesec might have intended to stem Ampere’s fury but he winced at Little Earth’s retort to the angry words. Ampere was rising in defense of her child and was receiving the blame from the other demigod. The confirmation that Zero was Ampere’s a thought that he wasn’t ready to deal with quite in this moment - there had been suspicions, of course - the blue lightning markings could hardly belong to anyone else. But who was the father? Was that why Gaucho was here? Ignoring the wrenching that thought did to his stomach, the implications of that pain, he focused on the facts and not on himself. He was intruding on a family moment then. He took a step back, recognizing just how out of place he was, and removing himself from whatever side of the argument he had originally chosen.

If they were a family and Isopia did not need him to defend her actions (he wouldn’t support the words she was using), then he really didn’t have a place here, did he? He had wanted to make sure the colt was alright, that all of them were alright, because in one way or another he did care for all those present. Was that not enough justification to be here?

He was honoured to be Zero’s sidekick as he watched the colt step between Isopia and Ampere, defending the actions of his friend and willing Ampere to be angry at him instead. A hero indeed. If only his sidekick hadn’t been so useless in the fight, this situation might not have occurred. Later, out of earshot of his mother, Mesec would compliment the colt for his bravery - both in the fight and now. But he wasn’t willing to risk the wrath of Ampere, or of Gaucho (her mate? or was he here just as Sultan?) in order to pay a compliment to the colt. Nor was he willing to interrupt the moment between mother and son, the sight of which eased that pain he felt. In both the tender moment he was witnessing now and the fierce protectiveness she had exploded with moments ago she was a mother. He hadn’t known it was a role she had taken on but oh, it suited her so well.

Though he had stepped back, he lingered for now - wary of leaving such a high-strung situation before it was completely resolved. If he was an outsider, he could be a (mostly) neutral, calm outsider.

In the wake of her outburst the quiet swelled like a sea that had ridden out the storm. Her final, biting words seemed to be the last of the winds spent. The stillness and the relative calm that came after only seemed to magnify what had been, but in the echo of it Ampere wasn't sure she had the strength left. So when Isopia said nothing, did nothing but as was asked, tension eased gradually from her body. She had just fought a god, had just nearly broken her heart, and now had wounded a friendship she needed (perhaps two if Mesec's demeanor was anything to judge), but he was whole and well and she felt loved for it.

"Yes," Ampere responded belatedly to her son, his words just now seeming to register as the dark bird flew away. "Let's," she said softly, pulling away from him by just the smallest amounts, as though loath to leave his side for very long ever again. Gaucho's words echoed the testament, but he was right too. Now that the fury and the fear had melted away she felt the ache, the one born of more than her heart. Ampere winced as her wings settled tighter against her back.

She glanced now, for the first time seeing him, to Gaucho as his fire wreathed them. She had not known it then, when he encased their boy, that he had the ability to heal. She had simply trusted him to do what was needed, but there was no doubting it now as her son stood before her breathing and of health. No doubting it as the flames gently warmed away the pulse of pain within her. Such an odd trait for a warrior like him to have, and she supposed it must be new because he had never offered it before. It seemed to suggest a change in him, and her lips wrestled a small smile for that.

"Thank you," she murmured as the fires fell away to the heatless ones that always licked his wings. Drawn to him, to the light perhaps, to the comfort definitely, she stepped towards him, muzzle extended in a quiet, brief touch towards his. Gratitude not just for the aid, but the words, the action behind them, and the child he'd given her twice now. She couldn't turn him away now, she never really could, not fully.

The starlight that had guided her from the flames she'd been burned by was forgotten beneath their overwhelming glow.

"Home," she affirmed as she continued to move on, nudging Zero with her.