Riley may have heard David's shouts, seen him and Ashleigh out of the corner of their eye build a wave to push the boat as far away from the destruction as possible. Joshua's yelp as he fell off the roof and scrambled to the bridge went completely unnoticed.

Soot and ash bled into the sky. Lava covered the horizon like an infected sore and the wall of Melberra collapsed. The city itself was soon engulfed in a cloud and the ash kept coming.

"Riley!" David's voice was a smack in the face as they jumped to attention, "help us!"

Grabbing their tablet, Riley rushed to the stern to aid David in their escape. The boat shuddered and rocked, almost throwing them overboard, but they soon joined David and Ashleigh, just as the child doubled over with a groan.

"Ash, get your brother!" David told her, "get him to help and you steer the boat!"

Ashleigh stumbled to the bridge as Riley raised a hand. The wave propelling the boat away grew taller.

"How bad is it?" David called as Riley booted up their tablet, balancing the thing precariously on a seat whilst maintaining the wave. Josh joined them, and the boat sped off that bit faster.

"Is it safe to have the 12-year-old drive?" he cried.

"We have to get away from… fucking… that!"

Riley opened the app they built themselves and… almost dropped the wave in horror.

"It's the entire continent! The entire Australian Traps have erupted… just, burst… and the country's a lava field!" They screamed, "we're beyond fucked!"

"Well where do we go?" Josh looked terrified. He held himself tall, working his magic to the best of his adolescent abilities, but he trembled. His shaky hand almost sent them tipping over as black clouds covered the sky above their heads.

"New Zealand?" David offered.

"Ye-" they glanced at the tablet, "no, no, no! stay away from New Zealand!" Their blood ran cold. "Taupo's erupted too!"

"Taupo?"

"The entire area," the red dot on their map spread, still tiny compared to the entirety of Australia next to it, but they knew hundreds of their people would now be dead. "Fuck! Toba too!" Toba was a lake now, and certainly not somewhere they'd expected to erupt. Just what was going on?

"South then," David gave a nod and the boat turned sharply, throwing the three of them into the gunwale.

"What the hell?" came Ashleigh's cry as the other three tried to build the wave up again. A lump of something black crashed through the roof, narrowly missing her skull.

"South, Ash! We need to go south!" David raised his hands and the wave pushed hard, scooping up the boat as he tried to balance escaping from the volcano and its toxic debris to their right, and heading south to safety.

"It's the entire Pacific ring," Riley whimpered before David smacked the tablet out of their hands.

"Right, we get it," he growled, "end of the world and all. Are you gonna help us?"

Riley gave a shaky nod, pulling themselves to their feet. Ash and rock rained from the sky, and Australia was just a red, glowing line in the distance by now. Joshua doubled over, but kept his part of the wave intact. There was ash in their hair, on their lips now and they needed to get away before they choked to death.

"We're going to make it," they told the brothers. Josh didn't look convinced in the slightest; David, on the other hand, gave a determined nod, took their hand, and, together, they raised their wave to steer the boat to safety.

It took a week for the effects of the explosion to reach what was left of Europe. Luca and Stefan had even managed to forgive Dragos for disappearing on them in that time. Just about.

Luca still brought it up from time to time, and Dragos hadn't gone hunting alone since. The trio just kept travelling with occasional breaks to hunt, close to the caravan. They'd also cut down on meal sizes at Dragos' insistence.

Stefan still didn't know what to make of Dragos' story, of the strange lady who just happened to know everything about him and what was going to happen and, instead of doing anything to help, just told Dragos to… not die. Stefan and Luca knew better than anyone that Dragos was only still alive by some sheer miracle.

Luca, at least, was a little easier to keep alive.

Unless Dragos was in danger, then Stefan knew he would have no chance of keeping him safe as he flew into a destructive rage that would leave no one but Dragos alive.

Why had he thrown his lot in with the Rotaru brothers again?

He glanced over at the two of them, sprawled out on the mattress whilst he huddled by the stove. Snow continued to fall past the windows, and he stared, unmoving, thoughts churning in his head and making him feel unbearably heavy. The fire crackled, but no living sounds kept him company. Besides, of course, Dragos' occasional conversations in his sleep, muffled by the blankets and straight up more ominous than any prophecy of doom.

The caravan was blue, something his father built when the family first became nomadic. Dragos had offered to 'repaint' it but Stefan would never allow such a thing – it was too important to him, plus Dragos' designs would probably be terrifying.

"Snowball… fireball… chances… the edge…"

It had been a lonely life, between the death of his parents and finding the Rotaru brothers, one he'd barely lived. With so few people about – to cling to -, loneliness was almost guaranteed, so he was grateful. And thankful. To them, and to himself for actually stopping to pick them up.

"Death… black inky heart bleeding… lake of death…"

Dragos turned over in his sleep and the rest of his horrifying tirade was lost. Boris darted out from under a blanket to seek refuge in Stefan's arms for once.

"Hey, don't mind him," he muttered, stroking the cat's fur as he began to kneed at his chest. Painfully. "Hey, stop that. Are the claws really necessary?"

When Boris finally settled down on his stomach, it had begun to rain, of all things. Stefan winced, making a note to himself to pile sandbags by the door before going to sleep. Rain meant storms 99% of the time and the last thing they needed was waking up to find the caravan had been flooded. At least the reindeer were secured.

It was a comforting sound, the rain pattering against the roof like a rockslide and – after finally peeling Boris off him, claws and all – Stefan piled sandbags by the door and settled back down to sleep by the fire.

Dragos awoke to the sound of screaming.

He was up like Boris upon smelling food, leaping out of bed to where the sound was coming from: outside the door. He wrenched the thing open to find Stefan half-buried in snow, clutching his face like he was being attacked by the… rain?

Ignoring the fact that it was not supposed to be raining this time of year, Dragos threw himself into the snow to get to him.

"Stefan!" he cried, "what's wrong?"

He found out almost immediately.

"What the hell?" The rain… hurt! It scratched at his skin and burned his eyes as he buried his face in his furs. "Stefan! Are you there?" He fumbled blindly, tripping in the snow.

"Dra- Get back inside!" The voice of Stefan was wonderfully near, and Dragos reached out to grab his arm.

"And leave you out here? Come on!" His scalp burned and tingled as the rain kept coming, but he pulled himself and Stefan to their feet, despite the other man's protests to be left behind. And when they reached the caravan, Luca was there to pull them in through the doorway to safety.

Dragos collapsed next to a whimpering Stefan, writhing as those whimpers boiled into screams. He was still clutching his eye as blood caked his cheeks.

"Steff! Steff what happened?" Dragos cried as Luca grabbed a ball of water from a nearby bowl.

"Out the way! Steff, I need to wash you and take a look at the wound." Stefan howled in response.

"Steff!" Luca yanked Stefan's arms away from his face to wash it with the water orb, and Dragos got a glimpse of a stream of gore running down Stefan's face, and the hole where his eye used to be.

And slipped out of consciousness, much like slipping on ice and knocking himself clean out.

When he pulled himself out of his fainting spell, Dragos found Stefan groaning on the bed, and Luca mopping up blood on the floor. He – slowly – pulled himself up to lean against the wall.

"Thanks for leaving me on the floor," he mumbled.

Luca tutted. "You really weren't a priority."

"What do you mean?"

He turned away, but Dragos still caught his grimace. "The rain took Stefan's eye."

Stefan groaned in reply, sprawled out on top of their blankets. Having had more than his fair share of knocks in the past few days than he'd have liked, it took a while for Dragos to get up and join him.

"Steff?" he whispered, "Stefan, you still hanging on?"

Stefan was a mess of bandages, half his face covered in white, and his remaining eye poked out, barely seeing. His skin was red and blotchy too, like he'd sat too close to the fire again and gotten burnt.

"Yeah," he rasped, "fucking regret waking up this morning."

"One of those days, yeah." Dragos breathed out a laugh; "what the hell happened?"

Stefan shrugged, still giving the occasional groan of pain. "I just went outside and… the reindeer were all dead… everything hurt. The sky was trying to melt me, just like it did with Luca 2, 3, 4-"

"I get the idea," Dragos grimaced, "poor Luca deer."

"Am I useless now?" The question caught him by surprise, and even Luca looked over in horror.

"Of course not," said Dragos, "come on, surely you know we just keep you around for your humour anyway." Stefan laughed.

"We shouldn't go outside until the rain stops," Luca sighed, "if it wasn't obvious."

"We have some supplies," Dragos added, "enough for a few days, if we ration appropriately and don't just eat because we're bored."

"Is this really the time to start throwing shade?" growled Luca.

"Just… don't let me catch you stuffing your face, alright?" Dragos turned back to Stefan, and began stroking his hair. Luca soon joined them, wrapping his arms around his brother.

"You don't need to worry," the boy said, "the rain will pass before tomorrow, and then we can move on."

"We don't have any reindeer," Stefan hissed, "how are we supposed to move?"

"Tomorrow, I'll go out and find some new deer," Luca told them, "or horses. Animals like me, and I'm sure I can tame them enough to pull the caravan."

"It's risky," Dragos warned him, trembling slightly in that way he only did when he was worrying about the boy.

"Look, we don't have to worry until the morning, right?" Luca shrugged, "I'm gonna work on my knitting to pass the time; I'm sure you'll find a way to amuse yourself today.

As it turned out, Dragos did not need to worry about their animal problem or the acid rain when they woke the next day. What he did need to worry about, however, was the fact that their caravan was buried to the roof in snow.

"So now what?"

Riley should have expected this. The end of the world, being friends with David and his siblings, of course the four of them would go out like this. Okay, they'd not expected it to be somewhere in the middle of the Indian Ocean on a boat that could easily be capsized, but the 'let's see what happens' attitude was surrounding them all.

When the volcanic clouds caught up with them, they'd retreated to the hull as acid rain pummelled the floating wood and thankfully didn't destroy it enough to sink the thing. Yet. Riley didn't know if they could expect more – their tablet ran out of batteries days ago. Unfortunately, their food stock was close behind.

"We wait til we've recovered," Joshua told the group, sprawled against the bulwarks, "and then we make a dash for land. I don't even care where."

"I think there's a settlement on the horn of Africa," Riley muttered. "We can just follow the sunset or something."

"Riles," said Ashleigh, "are we gonna die?"

"How on earth am I supposed to know that?"

"I dunno. You're supposed to be the smart one."

"Only because I'm surrounded by Australians."

David snorted. "If you were really smart, you wouldn't piss off a bunch of Aussies when we're all stuck at sea on a tiny, tiny boat."

"Like you'd do it," Riley scoffed, "I know you all love me."

"We're not dying though," David's smile fell, "it's just not our style. When we get our strength back, we'll head for land and… find some people, I guess." He shrugged. "We'll quit when we're dead."

"And then what?" Joshua looked around at them all, "what happens when we get to dry land and find people?"

"We survive," said David, with determination.

"Survive what?"

David bit his lip. "Fuck mate, I dunno." He turned to Riley; "what can we expect?"

"An excellent question." It was a good few moments before they spoke again. "Yeah no, we're fucked."

"Great," muttered Joshua, "just fantastic."

"I don't wanna die," Ash stared at Riley, eyes wide, pleading.

"No one's gonna die-"

"They just said we're all going to die, David!"

David sighed. "Riles, don't scare the kids."

"I'm just being honest. I don't know how long we'll survive. We could get by, but humanity as a whole? It's on its last legs."

"And what was it before?" David raised an eyebrow.

Riley reached into one of the many pockets on their shorts, pulling out a plastic bag containing tiny, shiny, rocks. "Pyrite," they told the group, "or Fool's Gold, to you. Um, that's what it's called. I'm not saying you're all fools. This time. But it's formed due to a lack of oxygen."

"Do you just carry rocks around all the time?" David raised an eyebrow.

"Yes."

"For scientific demonstrations, or to weigh down your tiny, tiny body?"

"Fuck you. Look," they held up the rocks, "these form on the sea bed when there isn't enough oxygen. We've found them in rock from the end of the Permian period."

"And again with the Permian," said David, "you think this is all happening again or is it just your favourite period in prehistory? Mine's the Ediacaran."

"I know. I've been looking into the end-Permian extinction ever since I came up with the pink water theory," they explained.

David snorted. "Nice to see you looking into something other than gloryholes."

"Not in front of the children!" cried Riley.

"Pah," David waved a hand, "does it matter anymore?"

"Well I mean," Josh piped up, "I kinda want to jump into the ocean now. Like, you know, before? I was still hopeful about making it through the end of the world. Now I don't even want to try."

"I can't believe I raised such a quitter," David muttered.

"Be that as it may," said Riley, "we do know what happened last time there was an eruption this size. I hate to be a prophet of doom-"

David disguised a scoff with a cough. Poorly.

"But we're in for some chilly times ahead," they threw him a glare, "a volcanic winter is unfairly hard to survive."

"I fucking hate the cold," he mumbled.

"Well, lucky for you it's not permanent. Because then the world's getting hot. The same clouds that will give us this winter, will boil the earth, creating global deserts, stagnating the seas, killing every living thing on earth. We're going to die in ice, then fire."

David, to their total surprise, just looked more determined than ever. "Fire? Come on! We can take a bit of heat! Fire can't kill a dragon and it certainly can't kill Australians."

Riley raised an eyebrow. "Dragons don't exist, and neither do Australians now, besides you three. But sure, fuck it. The earth will have to disintegrate before you morons give up."

"You know, we will probably have to eat Boris soon," Stefan warned Luca as he helped himself to more stew. Luca, for his part, ignored him.

It had been a week now, and the three of them had not seen the light of day, not once had there been a peek of sunlight. They could only really guess at how much time had passed, based on how many times they felt the need to sleep. It could've been longer, it could've been a few days. Dragos insisted it was a week though.

"If cats were at all tasty, don't you think we as a species would've realised by now?" the man in question reasoned, and Boris decided he'd be safer sitting on Luca's lap.

They were nearly out of food. No food meant they'd grow hungry, desperate, too weak and unfocused to hunt. So their hunts would be unsuccessful. Making them hungrier. And weaker. And Luca was starting to panic. Would anything out there even have survived this big freeze to hunt?

At least they wouldn't run out of water.

They'd closed the door to keep the snow from piling in, but everyone could see through the windows that they were still. Completely. Buried. Dragos had offered to move the snow, but even he hadn't tunnelled far before collapsing with exhaustion. And all the work he'd done had been for nothing, as more snow had soon cave in to fill the hole again.

Even now, Dragos was still recovering. Or sulking. Either way, he was lying in a tub of hot water, soaking himself until he wrinkled for want of anything else to do. Luca was huddled by the fire, but they were quickly running out of things to burn. Stefan, meanwhile, was doing the only other thing they could freely do: sleep.

Luca was sure Stefan was having a great time, but his snores added to the eerie world they found themselves stuck in.

Not to mention it was a fucking irritating noise.

"I can't take it anymore!" Dragos shot up, having presumably lost his mind from the sound of snoring. "I'm giving it another go!"

"Could you put some clothes on first?" No point in shifting a whole bunch of snow only to lose body parts to frostbite.

As Dragos piled on more and more layers, Luca tried his best to convince his brother not to attempt magic again, not after the state it put him in last time. He couldn't shift that much snow at full health, let alone stumbling around the caravan like a drunk toddler. And yet, despite all warnings, Dragos decided to charge ahead anyway, because he was Dragos Rotaru and he did what he wanted.

And what he wanted to do was get out before his brother starved to death. A noble cause, Luca supposed, but not at the cost of his own life.

"Stand back," Dragos began as Luca punched Stefan in the stomach so he'd wake up and – hopefully – talk some sense into his moron of a husband.

"Who died?" Stefan muttered, wiping drool from his mouth.

"Dragos if he keeps being stupid!" cried Luca, waving his arms, "he's going to try and melt us out again!"

"Dra, no," Stefan, with great difficulty and no depth perception, hauled himself up and stumbled over to the door, where – a thankfully fully-clothed – Dragos was leaning against the frame. Snow pooled on the floorboards under his boots. "You can't!"

"Stefan," said Dragos, voice flat but firm, "we don't have a choice. This snow won't have melted before we all starve to death."

"You're a self-taught novice," he said, "you're not powerful enough for this!"

Dragos glared at him. "I have to do something! I'm not letting either of you die, and if I have to sacrifice myself, then so be it!"

"And maybe neither of us want to live without you," said Luca.

"Speak for yourself," Stefan piped up, presumably as a joke.

"Look, if we're going out, then let's go together! Side by side as family!" Luca bit his lip. "What about the prophecy? Can either of us afford to die?"

Dragos snorted, "I take magic seriously as the next person, but either way, I'm going to die."

"And I'm going to have to live to see the end of the world."

"Sounds fun," Dragos slapped his shoulder, "you'll have a great time." And he raised his arms. Luca had never seen this expression before, the fierce determination in his eyes as his mouth twisted into a snarl.

A fireball formed between his hands, one he hurled right at the wall of snow. And another, and another. Water pooled at their feet. Dragos stepped into the gap he created and threw fire in the air. He swayed, but fire continued to stream from his hands, blasting away snow until he'd created a small cavern.

"Dragos…" Luca saw him buckle.

Dragos just screamed. Luca exchanged horrified glances with Stefan, then marched forward to help. He raised his arm to cast his own fireballs, joining his brother as they blasted snow away. Stefan crafted himself a shovel and ran forward to help. The ceiling fell away, and a waterfall of daylight burned at their eyes.

"We're free!" Luca cried, pulling Dragos into a hug. "You did it!"

Stefan stepped forward to widen the tunnel with his shovel as Luca and Dragos held each other up. They stared, breathless, at stony clouds above their heads, at a sky that - until that very moment - Luca had accepted he'd never see again. Stefan took his hand and pulled him up, and the three stumbled up onto dunes and dunes of snow. it was a flat world now, only the tips of trees poking out of fields and fields of snow and ice.

"What the hell?" Luca peered out, the world before him barren. There was not a hint of blue in the sky, and the clouds were almost black. It was still snowing, already clinging to his cheeks.

"This might be the end," Stefan murmured next to him.

Behind them, there was a groan and a smack of crunching snow as Dragos hit the ground. Luca wheeled around.

"Dragos!"