It could be seen from every angle. Salvador Limones saw it from his helpless position in the back seat of Olivia's car. Héctor could see it from the safe spot he found under Olivia's car. Imelda, Meche, and Manny from the hiding spots in the meadow. Glottis from the grass where he had been restraining a struggling Dante. The Legends from the air. The gods from the space between spaces.

They all watched as the little shack in the middle of the meadow cracked like a hatching egg, and then burst into a writhing mass of roots and tendrils. The stink of foul roses and peat washed over the hills in a rolling wave, choking their noses and eyes. It kept any of them from crying out in horror after watching Miguel's prison explode in front of them.

None of them were prepared for it to happen again.

But out in the meadow, the mass that had been Hector LeMans' secret hideaway wriggled and writhed until a sliver cut through. It blinked with gold before, up from its insides, a column of fluttering papers sprayed out in a fountain to the sky above. They were Number Nine tickets. Thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, all swirling in the breeze in loops on top of each other before branching out on its long flight to its owner. They cradled the sky like tree limbs and twinkled in the distance like stars. They sliced through the meadow's thick carpet of flowers, leaving the pieces to be swept up into the air by the current and blown out into oblivion.

Miguel missed all of that, of course, because he was right in the middle of it. He only looked when the protective dome of golden tickets around him broke to join the rest of the flock. The light hitting his eyelids meant he could breathe again, and with equal joy and annoyance, Miguel's first mouthful of air tasted like dog breath.

"Dante…" Miguel reached out and scooped the elated alebrije into his lap. He'd made it. Dante was so happy, he was almost crying, and he wouldn't sit still for trying to lick Miguel's ears. Miguel just let him. The last time he had his eyes open, Hector LeMans was melting into green moss and just starting to blow up. Miguel closed them, held his nose shut, heard the explosions, and when he opened his eyes again everything was golden and sunshine-y. And that was after getting kidnapped. After getting attacked by demon birds. After out-singing De La Cruz, who was now dead twice. After…

Miguel slumped hard on the ground and laughed at Dante doing the same. "I'm tired."

"Miguel!"

"Papá Héctor!" All the energy came back to him with one word. Miguel bounced to his feet and ran out of the column of tickets, immediately into the crowd of skeletons waiting for him with open arms. Héctor scooped him up into the biggest hug before everyone else piled on top of them to squeeze his shoulders and ruffle his hair and check that he was okay.

"You're alive!" Héctor sounded on the verge of tears. "Cristo, mijo, I was so scared! I thought- what is on your back?!"

Miguel, caught off guard, laughed. "Okay, so, remember when I was almost all skeleton and I was growing wing bones? Well, they never stopped…"

Out in the meadow, away from the little mortal's concerned crowd, the gods stood and observed. La Muerte watched aghast as each ticket, each tiny sliver of her eternal soul, fluttered past her head like lost butterflies. Xibalba, for maybe the first time in his very long existence, chose his words very carefully.

"There's no way we could have ever known, mi amor…" He took his place at her side and gently held her hand. "All of this is outside of what should ever be possible…"

"A hundred years of stealing pieces of my soul…" La Muerte could feel some of them as they reunited with their owners. With each one, her vision cleared and her pain abated. "For… what? What good does someone else's destiny do you?"

There was only one person she could possibly ask, and Manolo was lifting him over his head and screaming.

"LEGEND FEATHERS!" Manolo had never been more psyched to see wings in his afterlife. Miguel had grown a pair of his own, blazing orange trimmed with black in jagged flame patterns. They were objectively awesome. They were downright badass! It could only mean one thing, and he was happy to parade Miguel above the others to display it. "Miguel Rivera's gone Living Legend, baby! WOO!"

Grounded and grumpy, Manny chided the prettyboy. "He's not a Legend, you dumbass, you have to be living first to be a Legend! He's an angelito!"

Maria stole Miguel out of Manolo's grip and held him up herself. "Looks like Legend wings to me! Black and orange, flame pattern?! Come on, that's way too cool to be normal wings!"

"She's right!" Miguel was stolen again, this time by Glottis, who proudly put the boy on top of his head and out of the other's reach. "They're Bone Wagon print! Look at you, Mee-ho! Taking after your Uncle Glottis!"

Miguel laughed like crazy, and Dante flew up to flop back down on Miguel's back. It made the most colorful stack of beings with skin and hair, flanked on either side by Pepita and Chuy and backed by Plata. The skeletons around them looked drab by comparison.

Glottis chuckled. "Look at us; we're the Musicians of Brehmen!"

"How are all of you so calm about this?!" Imelda, never calm about anything, protested. "He has wings! How could you not tell us you had wings for an entire year?!"

Joaquin posed all cool, gesturing at his ghostly eye. "Joaquin knew-"

"Joaquin shut the hell up!"

He immediately fell out of the cool pose and hollered right back. "But I did! I have special eyes! It's just not my business to out people who are keeping secrets!"

Miguel shrugged. "I mean, it's not like it was a secret-secret, there was just a million different other things going on that were more important."

Meche commented, "And only ever on Dia de Muertos."

"Verdad?!" Miguel surged with newfound strength all based on anger. "I hate this day now! Nothing every happens unless it's Dia de Muertos!"

Xibalba slunk in behind him. "Boycott Day of the Dead!"

"Yeah!"

"From now on, everybody stays here with me!" Xibalba grinned. "No more visiting the living!"

Miguel whipped around and nearly slapped him. "No!"

All of the tension and fear was dissipating along with the remnants of flowers. They were laughing, chatting among each other and relaxing. La Muerte felt the need to cut in; she had to ask. Had to know. She looked the little mortal boy over. His elbows and knees were touched with green grass stains, and his head was rumpled and mussed. Other than the wings on his back, he looked… normal. Perfectly plain and living, resting atop a demon's head and surrounded by alebrijes and the dead. Happy, yet… out of place.

She didn't have much time.

Miguel gasped. "Salvador's in Olivia's car, I forgot!"

It could wait just a little longer. There was a fitful scramble to jimmy the lock of Olivia's car door before Glottis just wrenched it off the hinges. Sal's skull sat on the back seat while his sprouted body lie in pieces on the floorboards. La Muerte tapped his crown and summoned up all that remained of his body before filling in the missing bones with sugar candy. It made for a Salvador that was not only sterling white, but radiant, if naked at the moment. Xibalba summoned clothes for him before Salvador lost any of his already immense dignity.

Salvador breathed easy and saluted the assembled souls. "I am so sorry for what happened to all of you. Olivia Ofrenda shot me in the back not long after Miguel took to the stage. I was caught completely unawares."

"LeMans said something like that…" Miguel mentioned. "He said he and Olivia were covered with tickets, and it made them invisible."

"It explains a lot," said Glottis. "Those tickets are divine. You can't destroy a little piece of a god, or put a little serial number on it, or anything that lets you keep track of a mortal object. But then you also just kind of look over it because it's divine, because it's kind of everywhere and… kind of not."

"We can't be seen unless we want to be seen," Xibalba added.

"And I never wanted those tickets to go to anyone but their individual soul." La Muerte ran her hands through her hair, her headache melting away drop by drop. "They don't think, but they have some will of their own. If they didn't want to be seen, then…"

Some of it still made no sense. Why did LeMans even want them? How did he control them? She'd never know now, and none of the others seemed inclined to find out. Not when three little tickets finally made their way over to their proper souls: Salvador, Meche, and Héctor. The tickets settled into their collarbones like a bird in its nest. Meche stroked hers; Héctor just let out a long breath and leaned into Imelda's side. Salvador said nothing. To them, the time must have seemed immeasurably long. It was all so unfair…

But they had all gotten this far by being fair to each other, hadn't they?

There would always be questions, but there would be no more time. La Muerte reached into Miguel's heart to pluck his heartstrings. Her hand came away empty, and Miguel protested.

"Quit doing that!"

La Muerte held up her empty hand. She couldn't keep the melancholy out of her voice. "Miguel, the curse is broken. It's time for you to go home."

They all went quiet, smiles falling. Glottis took Miguel off his head and gave him a hug and a pat on the back before lowering him to the ground. Miguel immediately ran to his great-great-grandfather for their last goodbye. Héctor knelt down on the ground and caught Miguel up in a tight hug.

"Three years went by fast, huh?" He kissed the top of Miguel's head. "I love you, mijo."

Miguel gripped tight. "I'm gonna miss you."

"Just know I'll be waiting here for you, okay? … for a long time." Héctor shook Miguel's shoulder and looked him right in the eyes, his voice firm and even. "For a long, long time, all right? Stay alive."

Miguel giggled in spite of the weight of the moment. It was what Héctor wanted, because he returned the smile in kind. "Sí, Papá."

"Good. Now come hug your Mamá."

Miguel turned to Manny.

"I meant Imelda-!"

Miguel went to all of them, saying goodbye one by one and saving Imelda for last. She only held his hands, and Miguel didn't approach her any further.

"Miguel," she told him. "My final gift to you, as your family: play your music. Let no one tell you otherwise. Especially not Elena. And you can tell her you received that order directly from me. I'm about the only person left she'll listen to."

"Gracias, Mamá Imelda."

"Someday…" Imelda gave his hands a squeeze. "When we meet again, and this is all further away from us…"

Miguel shrugged, small and shy in front of her. Neither could complete the thought.

It was Xibalba who laid his hand on Miguel's shoulder and gently lead him away. Miguel's gaze never left his unliving family, even while La Muerte clapped her hands and showered him in magic marigold petals. He collected a handful in his palms while the Living Legends stretched their wings and bounced on their heels.

"We'll watch him until he's back with his living family!" said Manolo. "And then we'll be right back! Get it all sorted out at End of the Line, get everybody's tickets in order, stuff'll be great-!"

"Little dude's gonna fly!" Joaquin cheered. "Everybody watch! Gotta do, like, pixie dust and stuff!"

Maria patted more firmly on Miguel's new wing joints. "We'll be here to catch you if you need it. So just be ready, okay?"

"Exactly." Xibalba ran his claws through Miguel's hair and yanked playfully on his hoodie. "We'll keep him safe."

"Everybody…" Miguel tried to speak, but he could feel tears on his cheek. He could see them on Héctor and Manny's eyes, and Salvador's smile was just a little strained. What could he say?

Only one thing seemed fitting. "I'm never gonna forget any of you."

The marigolds were like the sugar skull but entirely different. Miguel felt almost as if they grasped him with warm little hands and pulled him into the air, and unlike the sugary whoosh of the skull, he kept full awareness of his body in space. The wing under his wings held him up, and with Dante ahead of him, he soared out of the Land of the Dead and made his all too fast way back towards the Land of the Living.