One of the few animals that Ava has been all that personally familiar with was a cougar, a friend. So she recognizes the tilt of the head, and offers her hand out to gently cup her muzzle.

"His joy should live on in your heart," she says sadly. Trying to remind herself the same, clinging to thoughts of her husband she believes lost. Brave and determined and loving and so principled. She has to try and be those things for herself now. "That's what somebody once said. That somebody isn't truly gone as long as we remember them."

She turns her gaze back. "Ava. Starr."