Rain

It should have been raining. It always rained in movies. Ippin glared up at the clear Coruscant sky and then looked away in silent frustration. It wasn't going to rain.

Next to her, Priire was having some of the same thoughts. She hugged the small bundle closer to her chest and glanced over at her sister. The fiery redhead was silent... as silent as the roof they now stood upon. A few minutes ago there were three other beings on this roof. Cats. Their cats. Solai - the rascally green-eyed tabby. Schylar - his calico wife. Starr - the lisping lilac kitten.

Not too many days ago, Priire and Ippin had been celebrating the wedding of the two adult felines. Ippin had known that all too soon after the ceremony, the cats would have to leave. She'd seen the future, and she knew what had to happen. Still...

It was hard. Hard watching the cats stepping through the portals. Starr leapt farther forward in time than her parents; she went back to the time she'd come from so many years ago. The kitten hadn't aged a day by some miracle of time travel.

Solai and Schylar didn't move quite so far, only to the end of the Darkness. They avoided all the devastation the intervening years would bring to land in the laps of the newly awoken or battle-worn senshi of years future.

That was good. The senshi - what few there were left - would need a fresh outlook, a friend with a spring in his or her step, a hope for years to come.

Ippin wanted to scream. The weight of wars yet to come pressed hard at her from all sides. She wished that she, too, could fast forward through the hard years that faced them as if it was some holovid movie she'd seen thousands of times.

Neither sister spoke as they watched the Coruscant wind blow far-off clouds into fascinating shapes. Priire wanted to curse something, anything. She could feel the Darkness like a shadow at the edge of her vision. If she held still long enough, she could even see a black mist creeping up on her. Whatever devastation would come among her stars, she knew that she'd face it lonelier than before. She'd always unconsciously looked to Solai to pick her up in her bluest times, and since Starr had been with them, that kitten had more than her share of laughter. Laughter was something that the coming Darkness would allow only in small bursts.

The pair wondered who would greet their cats on the other side. Would little Ame be there with UsaNeko in her chubby little arms to welcome the other kitten home? Who would grasp Solai and tease him about being married? What being would be there to smooth the time-distortion wrinkles in Schylar's perfect fur?

Neither knew. They hoped, however, that in some form, they themselves would be there to greet the felines. Who knew what senshi would be spared the icy fingers of Darkness that had already begun to encircle Hoth? It was enough to hope that their planets survived. Priire knew her stars were eternal, and Ippin knew time would not stop... but beyond that was Destiny's Realm: guarded by a fickle deity and personified in a beautiful woman.

They turned from the place they had last seen their cats... their friends... to walk across the roof and depart. As they reached the edge, both females turned around for one last glance.

And the rain started to fall, gently erasing what footsteps there might have been.