The nest was colder than usual. Melodykit didn't really feel it, but he noticed the difference -- the way the moss no longer bent under his father's weight. No shadow blocked the dawnlight that spilled through the nursery wall like a sigh. No soft breathing beside him. Just the stillness of things that no longer mattered. Sugarhalo was dead. Oddy blinked once. Then again. He sat very still, tail tucked neatly, eyes tracing the paths the light made on the floor. That light had once touched his father too. Now it didn't. That felt important. Or...... something like important. Mel pressed a paw against the light and tried to feel what Sugarhalo might have felt. Warmth? Fear? Peace? Nothing. He hummed quietly. A strange, tuneless sound, like a whisper with no breath. Cheerful, but filled with strange sadness at the same time. He stood and padded outside, letting the wind push into his cream fur, zigzags bristling gently with it. He wondered if Sugarhalo still had fur, or if the wind had taken that, too. Cats were buried quickly. Melodykit hadn't seen the body -- only the looks exchanged, the way no one spoke his name like it was already too heavy for the air. He tilted his head toward the sky. "I should feel something", he said, calmly, to no one. "That's what they want me to do." Then he smiled. Just a little. Like his flank markings -- too sharp to be gentle, too gentle to be a threat. "I miss him, I think", he added. "And I think he misses me too." His tail flicked. Once. Twice. He didn't cry. Didn't even tremble. "I'll be just like you", he whispered, to the fading light. "But better."
