~💚~
A few kids from town play in the grass in front of the Madrigal house. A crack forms on the ground next to them and they look up at the candle, which flickers unnaturally. The House shakes. Frightened, the kids run away from the House, where a GROUP of people is gathered.
"You should have told me the second you saw the vision! Think of the family!" Abuela stands in the foyer with the rest of the family, scolding her son-in-law.
"I was thinking of my daughter!" Agustin bites back, Julieta coming up to stand next to him.
A gust of wind blows snow across the room and Abuela turns to the culprit.
"Pepa, calm down!" She hisses.
"I'm doing my best!" Pepa bites back.
"Yes." Felix, standing over his wife batting away snow clouds agrees.
"You're lucky it's not a hurricane!" Pepa adds, adding speed to the wind she was already producing.
In the main plaza, Dolores sat looking in on the adult's conversation before sighing and pulling back, sitting with her back to the wall before turning her attention to the boy sitting beside her. Nikolai sat with his head in his hands, buried in his knees as he hisses and groaned at the emotions banging around in his head. Dolores rubbed and patted his back before looking up at Camilo who sat on Nikolai's right, the younger boy wearing an expression of worry for his cousin.
"Mamá, you've always been too hard on Mirabel." Julieta narrows her eyes at her mother.
Small cracks emerge around them, decorating the faded walls.
"Look around. We must protect our family, our Encanto. We cannot lose our home!" Abuela says sternly before a knock interrupts them.
"Señora, perdón, people in town are becoming anxious about the magic. They want to see you..." One of the village seniors enters from outside, a group of villagers behind him.
"Mirabel was in that vision for a reason. Find her." Abuela orders as she pulls on her shawl and leaves.
As Abuela leaves, the house shakes, and more cracks form along the floor. Dolores and Camilo share another look as Nikolai coils into himself more, beginning to whimper as he fists his hair.
"Let's take him to his room~" Dolores begins but is interrupted by her's and Mirabel's parents walking into the room.
"We need to find Mirabel," Julieta states.
"Niko isn't feeling well," Camilo calls, looking from his cousin to his mother.
"I'm fine~ I just... need some space," Nikolai snaps, standing shakily before pulling his hood up and slowly making his way to his room.
Feeling the earlier tremor, animals fly and run off scared inside Antonio's room.
"We might wanna hurry." Mirabel urges as Bruno prepares a sand circle for his vision.
"Ya can't hurry the future... And what if I show you something worse? If I see something that you don't like, you're gonna be all, "Bruno makes bad things happen, oh, he's creepy and his vision killed my goldfish." Bruno rants, sitting down in front of Mirabel.
"I don't think you make bad things happen. Sometimes family weirdos just get a bad rap. You can do this..." Mirabel encourages as Antonio hands Bruno a stuffed jaguar.
"For the nerves." Antonio smiles at Bruno and nods, like, I believe in you, then heads off.
Bruno looks at the stuffed jaguar, then up to Mirabel, considering. Then, with a weighty exhale, Bruno reaches into his ruana and takes out a handful of salt, holding it before he throws it behind his back.
"I can do this. I can do this. I can do this, I can do this." Bruno lights a match, which he uses to ignite piles of wet leaves.
As the smoke begins to spiral around him and Mirabel, Bruno closes his eyes... entering a trance-like state. The magic fills the room and somewhere in the house, Bruno's door starts to glow.
Nikolai, who has just made it up the steps, hisses, and doubles over in pain, his eyes glowing brightly as the young teen is unable to handle all the feelings inside anymore. Nikolai panted as his pupil shifted from a sad, broken heart to an angry burning flame, to a slow vortex of worry and fear. Crawling along, Nikolai gives and sits himself down against the railing, panting heavily as he holds his "bleeding" heart. The floor around him suddenly begins to shake and he raises his eyes up, a bright gold light nearly blinding him.
"What the?" Nikolai shields his eyes, straining as he looks upon the now glowing bedroom door of his father.
"..." Nikolai's eyes go wide, his faltering pupils changing to settle in a large question mark, the foreign feeling of surprise and interest filling his soul.
With Bruno and Mirabel, the entire room begins to glow in the light of his eyes, the wind kicks up, blowing leaves and sand that begin to swirl around them, glowing brighter and brighter. Mirabel looks to Bruno who... looks at her and his eyes glow a bright emerald, with deep patches like flecks of jade.
"You might wanna hang on." He squeezes Mirabel's hands and energy surrounds them.
Mirabel gasps with wonder, as she is suddenly transported into...an impressionistic flash of visions. Casita is in chaos... The family running! Then, a shape... Mirabel... standing amidst the expanding cracks... Bruno starts to falter.
"It's just~ it's just the same thing, I gotta stop~!"
"No, I need to know which way it goes... there's gotta be an answer! Something we're not seeing~!"
"You're looking at the same thing that I am! If there was something else~" Mirabel turns to look around.
"There! Over there!" Mirabel shouts, pointing behind Bruno.
Confused, Bruno turns, and it illuminates... a butterfly... flitting through the chaos. Bruno can't believe it.
"Butterfly! Follow the butterfly!" As they stand, the butterfly lands on a reed in a river which dissolves as something begins to glow behind it.
"Where is that...?" The images flutter, and Bruno struggles to see them.
"It's all outta order..." The image starts to come into focus, it's the candle burning brighter.
"It's, it's the candle! The candle's getting brighter!"
"I think you're gonna help the candle!" Bruno cheers.
"How?!" Mirabel asks.
Bruno's vision moves... showing Mirabel and a glowing figure. As Mirabel wills herself to bring the figure into focus... we see the shape of a woman
"There's someone with you! And you -you fight her!" Bruno raises his fists.
"What?!"
"Wait no, no, no, no -- is that a hug?!" Bruno squints trying to interpret what he's seeing.
"Am I fighting or hugging?!" Mirabel asks.
"An embrace! To make the candle bright, you have to embrace her!!"
"Embrace who?!" The images grow more and more volatile.
"Almost there..."
"Who is it?!"
"Almost there... I, I~ I got it!" As Mirabel steps forward... it's...
"Isabela?!" Mirabel shouts in anger.
A flash of light ends the vision, leaving the pair with glittering sand which falls like rain. Bruno looks at the new emerald vision "plate" and smiles.
"Oh, your sister, that's great!"
Mirabel stares at it in disbelief. Bruno realizes she hates his vision and chucks it like it's garbage.
"Every time..." He sighs.
Back on the second floor, sitting at the top of the steps opposite Bruno's door, Nikolai stood staring at his father's glowing door. Every day for the week after Bruno left, Niko would push through this door, run up those mountains of stairs, and into the vision cave hoping, praying his father would be there... Be standing there in the dark, turning at the sound of Nikolai's appearance and running to give him a hug.
Nikolai's breath became more ragged, he pulled himself up to stand and make his way up the stairs. Nikolai panted as he raised his hand slowly toward the knob. His father had to be back in there right... the door was active... it hasn't been active since Bruno left... when he stopped using his gift... But, if his door worked... if his powers were active... if he was back...
Niko looked up from the doorknob with hope practically seeping from his whole body, his hand finally meeting the cold metal of the handle before... he frowned... the golden glow of Bruno's door fading. Nikolai stepped back, furrowing his brows as he watched the sparkle die.
'No...' And like a hammer to glass... Nikolai's heart shattered.
"No!" Nikolai's eyes filled with tears as he slowly stepped away, gritting his teeth.
A noise behind him caused the young teen to turn and look across the hallway, his narrow eyes looking at the doors lining the walls and the pot plants sitting around. Nikolai scoffed, hopping down the steps to the tower before heading up his own, slamming his door behind him.