Drop. Drop. Drop. The first timid drops fall on the glass, are replaced by new and new ones, and, emboldened, knock louder and louder. They blur the world outside the citadel in uneven streaks, as if it doesn't exist at all. And maybe that's the way it is. Today. Now. When everything collapsed and ceased to exist, leaving only this-torrential rain and wind, tearing off the leaves and driving the trees to the ground. A storm raging both outside and inside.

As it was then. The clouds that covered the sky. The lightning that broke the world in half. And the two of them-then almost brothers, but already rivals. And opponents on different sides of this barrier. A rumbling clap of thunder-a warning? Now this is especially hard to believe. After all, it was on that day that the world turned upside down. Along with the bitter truth of his birth, which may be better not to know. However, isn't fate, karma, a foregone conclusion even before we are born? Who knows?..

Cap. Cap. Cap. Monotonously, irritatingly, tirelessly, as if at one point, his incessant song, more like a cry, hits the head. It drives you crazy, it drives you to frenzy. You want to scream, cover my ears, break something, or even kill the first person who comes to hand-just to drown it out, not to hear it. Too much is connected to it and emerges from the depths of memory, safely hidden, but still alive, capable of hurting. He has long disliked rain and has many reasons for it.

It was as if the sky had broken through, flooding the village and its surroundings, and many, many kilometers away. It seems that the whole world was flooded with these tears of the sky, more than paid for the debt for the dry days that reigned not in April. But-as always-it's too late. If it had rained a day or two earlier, there might not have been a terrible fire that consumed half the village, and everything else that could have been avoided.

Is it possible?.. He doesn't know. He just stares silently into the dim, rapidly darkening distance outside the compartment window. In the next one, his baby is fast asleep next to the nurse, whose smile is so reminiscent of a mother's joy and pain in one. It's probably his now. What is in this life belongs to him, for there is no one else to take away. Karai is not bothered by the rain, not tormented by nightmares and for this he is ready to thank all the gods. Because he's probably never going to do it again.

A rumble like the sky fell down. A bright flash illuminates the hall, flooding it with an unnaturally disturbing bluish light. It highlights every corner, every crack, every grain of sand. Almost an X-ray beam, from which it is impossible to hide. Something that had always annoyed him, the shadow warrior. It doesn't matter now. Nothing to be afraid of. There's no one to hide from. Nothing to hide in fear of losing.

Almost the same sinuous horned lightning-as always, unexpected and sudden. And exactly the same question-on a theme that seemed to have been exhausted for a long time. That's what he thinks. But his daughter looks at him intently and searchingly, as if she knows something. This is unnerving, provoking unnecessary rudeness. He walks away without waiting for more questions. He doesn't find the right words to explain everything that is necessary. And this becomes his defeat. Again. Once again, he curses fate for being tongue-tied, because of which he again has to lose the most precious thing. Once again, it is irreversible, he reads it in Karai's slightly narrowed, burning eyes on the day of her escape. She won't forgive you. And he won't come back, not with any good.

Wind. Hitting my face and knocking the tears out of my eyes. It lashes painfully at once burned cheeks, blinding, narrowing the world to a distance of two steps. The cloak, soaked in the heavenly moisture, lies like a wet rag on the broad shoulders, which are now powerlessly lowered. Thunder rumbles again and again, like the wrath of the cloud goddess. Lightning strikes higher places, more and more often, closer and closer. Somehow bypassing his post. However, if the wrath of heaven fell on his head, he would hardly be afraid. Too long ago, life had lost its meaning for him, and today ... today, perhaps, it would have been even better.

Today is exactly the same torrential rain, unexpected for October. Karai had disappeared into wall of it not half an hour ago. He saw that she had successfully escaped from the ruined laboratory. But that's where the luck ends. After all, today, through his fault, another dear creature suffered. By his carelessness and stupidity, which he will never admit out loud, but this will not prevent them from eating away at the soul with acid. And the fact that-again and again-he didn't want it doesn't change anything.

That was why, after sending his cervantes away and ordering them not to show up, he stayed here. In the stormy darkness of the cold autumn night. The surrounding houses have long been hidden by the early twilight, through which the warm yellow lights of the windows twinkle like distant stars. As distant and indifferent as the stars. Aliens. There is no more light in his house, no more heat. It seemed to him that it had never been... and he only realized his mistake now. As always, it's too late.

"I will avenge you, my daughter," the familiar words come out almost in a groan. Utterly familiar-and useless. It won't get back what he lost. He only himself can done it, but how he can ... it's unknown. Yet?..

But he will, of course. Oroku Saki, the leader of the Foot clan, nicknamed Schroeder, knows it sure. Otherwise, why all this? But no, he would return Karai. And she wouldn't give it to anyone else, even if she had to lock it away from the world. No one else would try to steal his treasure.

With such thoughts, he silently looks at the sky. His lips form a silent promise, his eyes fixed on nothing. And the rain falls from the sky, like tears that it is not destined to shed. Tears of heaven for a ruined soul. Only for whose?..