"Well," Kipo said, depressed. "The world is flat."

She quickly corrected herself. "This world is flat."

Bipo kicked at the ground with their claws. "This is probably what your friends was talking about," they noted. "A way off this world."

Kipo thought back to the map Tulip left with their coats. If she remembered it right... this was exactly where the map ended. Dammit. Of COURSE this is what Arlen meant. Because nothing could ever be easy for them, could it? It always had to end like this: in complete despair.

At least this was an end where this world couldn't get at their flowers, but... no, Kipo refused to think about it.

Kipo sighed, pulling herself up from where she was on the ground. The snow underneath her was soaking into her clothes, and she shivered.

Bipo awkwardly shuffled around, opening their wings like they were preparing to leave, but at the last second, they paused.

"I assume you need a ride back," they grumbled. "Well? Ready to go?"

Kipo opened her mouth, then closed it, looking over to the night sky opening up above her. She shook her head, and Bipo closed their wings, grumbling to themself. But they didn't argue.

Kipo tore her attention away from the bone dragon, instead turning it up to the night sky above them, moonless, as always. She had done this a lot in the town, when she was waiting for Bipo, Adam and Wirt to come back. She would have gone herself, but the logic that she might get in the way of Adam's plan and the possibly they might miss each other out there kept her in that town. Now, she wondered what might have happened if she meant and tried to help... would it have been different? Could they have-?

Kipo shook her head, abandoning that train of thought. Instead, she continued her thought process about the moon.

So many times, Kipo had gazed up into the night sky she loved and knew a lot about, but never once had she questioned the absence of the moon. It wasn't like her, Kipo knew, and it didn't make any sense. None of them, not any of them in the town ever thought to wonder? Weird... It just didn't seem possible.

Suddenly, Kipo heard Bipo shift behind her, straightening up in alarm.

"Kipo," Bipo said warningly, but Kipo was already turning around. She spotted it immediately, probably sooner than Bipo had.

"Hurricane..." she breathed, and this time, she knew she was right.

A dark shape flew down out of the clouds that had moved behind them. It was moving quickly, and though the first time Kipo saw it, it was miles away, it crossed that distance in seconds, and Kipo stumbled back as it descended in her, throwing up her arms as they nearly crashed.

The wicked talons Kipo and glimpse before hooked into her arms, tearing into them and catching, making Kipo cry out, and even Hurricane let out a cry of alarm as he was suddenly jolted to a stop before he managed to tear his claws out.

Kipo grabbed at her forearms, feeling the horrible pain shoot up through them, the deep cut leaking way too much blood to be good. Meanwhile, Hurricane was rising up to the sky once again, and Kipo stared at him, confused for a second. At first, she wondered if he was leaving, and then quickly realized how wrong she was when Hurricane turned back down towards them, strong wings beating furiously and claws up and ready for another strike.

The next attack was faster than the last, but Kipo was prepared now, ducking out of the way. Bipo, now up in the air, flew towards Hurricane and trying to knock him out of the air, but Hurricane was faster, snarling as he evaded Bipo's attacked, twisting around them to knock his hard beak against one of their wing bones.

A crack split through the air, and Bipo cried out, their wings faltering as they wavered around in the air, and then suddenly dropped out of the air.

"Bipo!" Kipo cried, rushing over and catching the bone dragon in her arms before they could hit the groaned. In her arms, Bipo groaned and squirmed, letting out small whimpers of pain as they moved their hurt wing, now twisted in an unnatural angle. Kipo winced. There was no blood, at least, but it still look pretty horrible as she set the bone dragon down, watching Bipo dig into the snow with their hurt wing, but it didn't look like it was helping very much.

Kipo looked up at the sky again, glaring. In the time Kipo had caught Bipo, Hurricane had already begun his downward descent, and a second longer distraction would have been fatal to Kipo. But as luck would have it, she glanced up at exactly the right moment, and when Hurricane found her, she reached up and batted him up and out of the sky, for once acting quicker than the bird did.

Hurricane rolled across the snow, letting out a cry of surprise. But it wasn't long before he was moving, trying to get back up to his feet, spreading his wings to try and take to the air again. Kipo moved quick, striding across the snow to try and catch him, but she already knew she'd be too late. She was having just as much trouble on the snow as Hurricane was.

Luckily, Bipo was faster, bounding over the snow with the help of their wings, both healthy and not, and an invisible wind. Before Hurricane could get all the way up, Bipo had jumped on him, burying him into the snow underneath them.

Hurricane disappeared for a moment as Bipo laid on him. When Kipo slowed, finally arriving at the spot she had batted Hurricane to, she paused, and Bipo stood up.

Kipo sucked in a surprised breath.

Underneath Bipo, and looking rather indignant, Hurricane was stuck in their rib cage, unable to move within it. His wings were pressed up against the sides of it, with his feathers sticking out through the gaps. To be able to fit, his long neck was twisted so far around it looked like it hurt, but it didn't look like Hurricane was in pain. He just looked... when, he looked furious.

The sight struck Kipo as kind of funny, but mostly horrifying.

"Uh..." she started, addressing Bipo. They shrugged, Hurricane moving as their chest moved.

"A trick I learned from the other bone dragons," Bipo told her. Kipo shook her head, deciding not to question it. Instead, she knelt down to Hurricane. The one eye that was pressed against his body swiveled around to stare at her, then narrowed.

"You're here for my flower, aren't you?" Kipo said flately, not even bothering to phrase it like a question. "You're not a very good fighter. That's why you stick to your manipulation, isn't it?"

Hurricane snorted. "What do you know?"

"A lot," Kipo deadpanned, keeping her face and voice neutral though fury welled up inside of her. "But not everything. You're going to tell me the rest."

Hurricane rolled his eye.

"You are?" Kipo insisted, and from the swirling whirl of questions in her head, she chose one. "Why aren't you using your cabin anymore?"

To Kipo's surprise, Hurricane snarled at that. "It's YOUR fault!" Hurricane growled. "All of this! If you all had brought me what I asked you for, none of this would have happened!"

Kipo frowned, having no idea what he was talking about. "What? We DID bring you your flowers! You took them when your cabin disappeared!"

Hurricane sneered. "Oh, is that what you think? Despite how smart you think you are, you actually don't know anything, do you? The world took my flowers and my cabin, because he discovered what I was doing. Your fault, by the way. If you had just GIVEN ME THOSE FLOWERS-."

Bipo jumped, startled, while Kipo frowned, tuning out the yelling as she thought. If she was going to parse what he was saying... her eyebrows knit together as she thought.

"Oh," she finally said, stopping Hurricane mid-rant. "You... You were trying to betray world."

"Obviously!"

Kipo hummed. Despite realizing that, she didn't think he was on her side. Whatever he was betraying the world for, it wasn't out of sympathy. Kipo had not forgotten that he lied to her and let her friends die, just to reach his own goals.

If the story was to be believed, Hurricane had been here since the world changed, and he had spent... however many years just watching people come and die to build up the new world. Why was he suddenly betraying this system? What changed?

Well, logically, the near escape that happened to the last kids.

"What were you planning to use those flowers for?" Kipo questioned, her voice low. "Where you planning to do what the last guy did? Take power from the king for yourself?"

Hurricane finally seemed to pause, staring out at her with some that, for the first time, was not anger or superiority. Though Kipo doubted he was really looking at her.

Finally, he laughed, weakly. "...You think I want this? Any of this? You think I wanted to be stuck up there, unable to do literally anything as I watched people die over and over? I just want to stop all of this, to finally destroy this poisoned world once and for all. Until you people screwed it all up!"

"We could have helped you!" Kipo protested. "Do you think we like this world anymore than you do?! We're actually stuck and dying in it while you're above it all! We could have helped your instead of-."

"Wait," Bipo spoke up, looking up at Kipo. "Destroy the world?"

Kipo paused as she realized the full ramifications of what Hurricane said. Her eyes widened, and Hurricane sneered.

"You wonder why I didn't enlist your help...?" he asked her. "That's why. You don't know the torture I, or any of the rest of us have been through. It's been thousands of years since I've been stuck up there... and that's given me strength and conviction you can't imagine."

Kipo's jaw tightened. "There must be another way."

"And let me guess," Hurricane drawled. "It ends with you leaving and happy? Please. There are no happy endings here. If you leave, that would be a big blow to this world's power, but it'd just get sixteen others to take your place."

Kipo's mouth opened, and closed. "There has to be a way."

Hurricane shifted in his cage. "You think that I'm the only one who has done this? No... others have deviated, too, tried to stop this, and they were much kinder than I am. Of course, they all died, and now there's only a handful of us left. If you had followed my instructions, all this would be over by now! I'm smart, and I knew what I was doing, but you just had to screw it up, huh?"

Kipo crinkled up her nose, feeling her frustration mount. "It's not our fault."

"That's where you're wrong," Hurricane replied, and it didn't sound like he was trying to hurt her this time. He just sounded... depressed. "I don't have much time left. If I don't fix this, I'll die, and you all will die, and this cycle will continue until the world is satisfied, which will be never. Or, at least, until he runs out of people to kill."

Kipo let out a frustrated breath, her mind running at a thousand miles an hour. But whatever answer to all of this there was, if there even was one, eluded her.

It was ridiculous. These wish flowers, supposedly, could do anything, especially if they were powerful. But what could she wish for? That this all could be fixed? That it could never happen in the first place? That everything could go back to normal?

All possible thanks to the flowers, even though they were unthinkable. If one wish could do all this, Kipo didn't want to know what she might di with even a slightly thoughtless wish.

Hurricane shifted around in his cage.

"So?" he asked impatiently. "Is that it? Are you satisfied now?"

Kipo gave him an annoyed look. "No."

"Tch," Hurricane huffed. "Well, hurry up. I don't need you ruining my plans again."

"You have another plan?"

Hurricane stiffened. "A backup one. But don't ask me what it is, because I'm not telling you. I'm not letting you ruin this again."

Kipo narrowed her eyes. "You're going around to the other council members and manipulating them into giving up their flowers. You're going for quantity rather than quality."

"...No. That isn't it."

"Right," Kipo said, rolling her eyes. "Alright, fine. I'm not going to ask about your master plan. But I do have a different question."

"We don't have all day," Hurricane snarled. Kipo ignored him, instead bringing out the notebook, tucked safely away in her pocket. As soon as she brought it out, Hurricane sucked in a breath, a look Kipo couldn't decipher in his eye.

"Who was Pier?" Kipo asked, holding up the notebook to him. Hurricane's eye was fixed on it, his beak hanging open.

"You got this from the cabin," Hurricane said, his voice breathless. "You took it before the world took my cabin. You... saved it."

Kipo blinked. "Who wrote it?"

Hurricane gulped. "Pier... he was one of the first. When the world was first destroyed and the seeds of this nightmare were planted, and little boy showed up from another world, accidently wandering into this one. We loved him, cared for him... but the world needed his flower.

"Pier was the one who made all this possible, who showed the world that there are other worlds with even more powerful flowers than this one. When the world got his flower, it was able to bring more and more kids here... and this place became a slaughterhouse."

Kipo gulped, taking back the book and flipping through it. Then, more for Hurricane than herself, she nodded to Bipo, and Bipo opened their ribcage, their bones clicking. Hurricane tumbled out.

"What was he like?" Kipo asked, gently.

"..." Hurricane hesitated. "He was a sweet boy. Very shy... he loved marine animals just as much as he was afraid of them. Piranha was his favourite and he... well, he..."

Hurricane paused, the words seeming to get stuck in his throat.

Kipo paused, and then held out the book, as a peace offering. Bipo gave her an odd look, but Kipo ignored it.

Hurricane blinked. "You're giving it to me?"

"I think you need it," Kipo said, nodding. Hurricane gave her a look Kipo couldn't figure out, then, without another word, he scooped up the book and flew off with it, soaring up into the sky.

Kipo and Bipo watched him go.

"Why'd you do that?" Bipo asked, long after Hurricane disappeared. "Why'd you let him go?"

Kipo didn't answer for a long time, pondering over the question herself. "I don't think I can really understand what he, and the rest of them are going through, but I can imagine it, and it sounds horrible. I just... maybe the notebook was a reminder he needed."

"So you stopped him?"

"I wouldn't go so far as to say that," Kiposaid. She knelt down to Bipo, looking into their eyes as a sudden feeling ofdetermination burned through her. "But don't worry. I won't let him go throughwith that. I won't let him destroy the world."