The Last to Die
He lay in his bed, the blue sheets pulled up high around his neck. His short gray hair flowed wildly around his head and into his face. The sea-green eyes were now dull and lifeless. The smiling face was more tired than happy, more old than young. The room was dark with rays of sunlight breaking through the blue velvet curtains. He thought of his life and his glory days eighty years ago. He was now ninety four, all of his friends gone. He was an old, almost forgotten, man. Helpless, lonely, depressed but still happy.
He, Mouri Cye, had been the second oldest of his group. Not even the youngest, Yuli, was alive. Yuli had been murdered at the young age of sixteen. Ryo, the leader was found dead at 57 in his office. Heart attack, the number one cause of death, had taken its toll on the almost retired zoo caretaker. Mia died not too long after her loving husband, Ryo. It is said that she was so heartbroken that she could not continue to live. Sage, his youthful beauty and intelligence, had earned him a loving wife, high paying job as an actor, and enough extra money to keep the family dojo still running. He later died of natural causes. Rowen had eared a scholarship from NASA and became an aeronautical engineer with a minor in astronomy at the age of eighteen. He moved to the United States for college, and returned fourteen years ago to die of cancer. And Kento, his best friend in the whole world, opened a restaurant after his short career as an American football player. The poor guy departed in an operation for a brain tumor. He was only 60.
And now Cye was the only one left. It had been eight years since he had seen Sage. Almost eight years to the day. Rowen left the two of them ten years ago. He returned home to receive the traditional treatment, after American medicine failed him, which prolonged his life by two years. The three had stayed together even in the hardest of times. Even Sage and Cye stayed happy when it was the two of them. But now, Cye was all alone. He forced himself to think about the past and all the fun he had. Like the time the group went to New York. Sure, it had been a hard battle, but after they won and paid their respects to Luna, they had partied. Then, they returned to Japan and celebrated Ryo's birthday party, this time all of them attended.
Cye remembered the time that he and Kento had gone to "pick up chicks" for Cye's twenty-second birthday. Apparently, they ended up at Sage's favorite night club. Sage and Kento spent the rest of the night hitting on the girls. Well, the "babes" did most of the hitting. He, on the other hand, had sat at the bar drinking coke all night. That was when he met his first true love. The two ended up dating, getting married and having three kids: two boys and a girl. He remembered the time that he brought the two boys to meet Kento. They had loved the old lug, and Kento's oldest daughter even married Cye's eldest son.
Cye's mind drifted to his high school graduation ceremony. He, along with the other four Ronins, had a huge celebration afterwards. They were leaving for different colleges, or even jobs, but promised to keep in touch forever. And they had. Through the good times and the bad, the five stayed together. Even when they were separated by the Great Pacific the five still found a way.
Cye looked around his dark room painfully. He still had something of each of his friends': Rowen's favorite book, Sage's hairbrush, Kento's old overalls and a piece of Ryo's broken practice sword. Even Yuli and Mia contributed, Yuli added a wheel from his first skateboard and Mia a bottle of her favorite nail polish. Each item had been carefully arranged around a picture of the group after the fall of the dynasty. Many more items had been added: research papers from Rowen, movie posters and videos from Sage, pictures of Ryo caring for animals all around the world, Kento's football trading cards, Yuli's yearbook picture and many other miscellaneous pictures and items. Cye, like all of his friends had never told anyone about the armor or what really happened that year. He knew that each of his friends had hidden their orbs long ago. After Suzunagi, the lady who had given them their new armors, things had quieted down greatly.
Cye began to feel his life slowly slipping away. He remembered the first time that he had gone swimming. He was startled to find that he could no longer recall many of the other important events in his life. He found it even more startling that everything was growing darker. He could hear voices from downstairs. He could feel the cold night air, even though the windows were shut. He could taste salt water even though the ocean was many miles away. He could see the forms of his friends, just like they were the day Talpa was defeated. He could smell his wife's perfume. He could sense the presence of old friends, dead or even possibly alive. Cye's eyelids began to feel heavy. His arms began to droop. All of the sudden, the room went dark. Cye's body no longer took in a breath or moved. He had died on June 14, 2067, at 9:15 PM. He was ninety-four years and three months old to the minute.