The slopes of Mauna Loa, Hawaii. February, 2043.

"And so, we commit her body to the earth, in a last fond farewell..."

The small crowd watched, as the ornate casket was lowered into it's final resting place. Some wept, those few which had managed to become close to the deceased. Some merely watched with downtrodden expressions.

As the mouse reverend put away his notes, and the small service ended, a lone figure stood by the graveside. The body interred there had once belonged to one of her greatest enemies. Many battles they'd fought over the years. Some short, some protracted, but always with the good prevailing.

Pulling her long trenchcoat tightly around her against the chill February wind, Gadget Maplewood allowed herself some few small tears. As she stood here on this lonely stretch of sand, she felt every minute of her seventy-five years. As the matriarch of the Rescue Rangers, she daily oversaw operations that still required her to be in good physical shape, which for modern medicine wasn't difficult. It was moments like this, though, which seemed to drain the very reserves of strength from within her. She had only given a few thoughts when Fat Cat's fate had claimed him, or when the evil deeds of Norton Nimnul finally caught up. But this...this was something else entirely. She cried not only for the departed, but for the plethora of lost opportunities. All the wasted years.

Pulling a lavender handkerchief across her eyes, she turned away from the lonely gravestone, setting her eyes toward the transportation that waited for her. April and Leah, her twin daughters, sat in the pilot and copilot's seats.

"Are you okay, Mom?" April asked, concerned.

"I will be. It's just days like this that make me wonder. They make me wonder if we've really made any difference at all."

Leah's voice was sharp.

"Don't ever say that, Mother. Not ever. You and the Rangers have made all the difference in the world! Just think how many times New York and any number of other places would have been wiped off the map if it hadn't been for the team!"

"I know. I just wish...I just wish I could have saved her."

April put a consoling arm around her mother.

"I know, Momma. But you couldn't be your sister's keeper. She was long past that."

Looking back, Gadget realized that this was far more the truth than she had known. Casting a final gaze at the lonely grave, she climbed into the Rangerplane's latest incarnation, and gave the signal to lift off.

"It didn't have to be this way," she whispered to the wind.

Below, the solitary tombstone bore the only evidence to the onetime existence of the one it commemorated.

'Here lies Lawainie Lait, daughter of Geegaw Hackwrench and Labella Lait. 1970-2043.'