Well, this is the end, beautiful friends.

After almost a year and a half on this site (about a third of which I spent inactive), the time has come to hang up my… er, keyboard? Pen? I dunno.

I should probably start by getting the negativity out of the way. You may have noticed that I was far moodier than usual in the last author's note I wrote. I'm sorry to say that that continues here. It seems as if I've written 140K+ words of something that people don't seem to like very much. When I look at the performance of Rekindled Anew vs the performance of my other fics, it's suboptimal at best (favourites-wise, anyway).

It honestly makes me wonder if I've just written a bad story. And when you've sunk months of effort into something like this, that does NOT feel good, believe me. Worse is that without feedback, I can't even tell if what I've written is bad or not. This sort of thing can rob you of the ability to care anymore, and that's definitely happened with me. I'm VERY glad I pre-wrote all of my chapters, otherwise I probably would've let this fic wither and rot from a combination of having a job and a sense of apathy setting in. Apathy not helped by the fact that a lot of the talented authors who used to be part of this section have gone dark. Admittedly, this isn't REALLY the note I wanted to go out on, but then, I suppose I should be grateful that I'm wrapping things up here.

Now, before I get into the more positive stuff, I'd like to once more reiterate what the two plot points (Ash's letter and the Paw Patrol's vacation) I didn't wrap up were. Those were a way of leaving the door ajar for my return should it ever come about. The former would've even served as the continuation of this story. No other story by anyone else would (or will) continue this little saga that I've written. In the event I don't return, the argument could be made that Rekindled Anew rounds almost everything off.

Though honestly, me feeling as I am right now, I'm more interested in porting a couple of my fics over to AO3 (name's the same as on here, if you're interested) than writing anything new. Even then, the Paw Patrol fandom over there is somehow even smaller than here (and I refuse to touch Wattpad with a ten-foot sterilised stick).But then, who knows, maybe something will spark my obsession with a silly preschooler's cartoon anew. It already happened once, didn't it?

Right, if you're still with me after the phenomenal amount of whining I just did, then let's get to the more positive stuff. Though there isn't much of it, I want to get to thanks first. Namely, thanking the people I "met" for lack of a better term throughout my time here:

LuigiWife1551, PupPupGo, VenusDemilo-Shirolover2, Tony Moonstone and Taurusology: Just about all of these people ended up dropping by to leave reviews, favourites and whatnot at some point or another throughout my time here, and honestly, writing stories wouldn't have been half as interesting without their feedback, despite almost all of these people moving on to other ventures by now. Guys, I don't know if any of you will read this, but wherever you may or may not be now... thank you all.

SharpDragonKlaw: This lovely person was the very first one to interact with a story that I wrote. And for each one since, they've continued to drop by. Thank you so much for sticking by me for this entire near-year and a half.

Zojak: Can't go without mentioning this dude. Ever since last year, I've been in near-constant communication with him, and honestly, if you want a reason for me NOT giving up writing this behemoth, look to Zojak. And that's to say nothing of him making covers for each of my fics and not asking anything in return. I'm very, very lucky to have made such a good friend here.

And last, but not least, the Guest who took enough of an interest in this fic to review all the chapters that they could. You may not know this, but knowing that at least one person out there has enough interest in what I'm writing that they'd regularly leave reviews honestly gives me the strength I need to keep uploading. Whoever you are, wherever you are... thank you so much.

And of course, thanks go out to everyone else who favourited, followed and reviewed this story, along with those who enjoyed any of the other stories that I've written here.

I feel like I should also give a bit of background on this fic. Honestly, I wasn't intending to continue Relight the Fire, but the more I batted the idea around in my head, the more I came to like it. I just didn't expect it to balloon to being over twenty times the length of the fic that started it. And in that sense at least, I'm proud.

What even sparked this off, anyway? I suppose it was my opinion on character death in fanfic. All too often I see characters being killed off recklessly and thoughtlessly. Such as to get them out of the way so an OC can take over, and/or it happens and then the survivors simply forget about it. They go about their lives as they normally would. Virtually no trauma or weight on them in sight. And/or the dead in question are simply replaced like nothing.

Let's ignore the fact that in this case, the Paw Patrol are children no older than 10 (human) years old and that that's the exact opposite of the way a close-knit group of children with nearly no adult supervision would react if one of their own died. The way character death is handled in fanfic generally leaves me feeling incredibly empty.

So I wrote something where, even though the character in question didn't die, the effects of it even looking that way were earth-shattering for everyone in question. The Paw Patrol were unable to function with even one of their own dead. They were scarred by what happened. And even though everything turned out OK in the end, no-one will ever truly get over what happened.

What's next for me? Well, I'll just disappear back into the ether. I said all the way back in Primary Fears that that was my intention. I just didn't expect to write quite as many fics as I did. I suppose that's a good thing, isn't it? And hey, it even resulted in this very fic. I also may end up putting up some writing tips on my profile. Just for anyone who seeks to get into writing. If I can help someone out even though I'm no longer as present as I once was on the site, then I'll be a happy bug.

Now, I'd love to say that I'll still be active checking my PMs, but honestly, since FFN removed the "email on PM" feature, I can't even guarantee that now, unfortunately. FFN really haven't left us much of a choice after removing the feature. Wanton gutting of useful features is one more reason to emigrate to AO3 I suppose. Still, if you want to reach me via PM, please don't let this dissuade you from trying, since I'll still swing by every once in a while to check them.

I suppose I'll round off by saying one more thing. Regardless of whether I return or not, I thank you all for the bottom of my heart for supporting me and enjoying what I wrote. I wish every one of you all the best for the near and far future.

And now, for the final time:

PyreFly out.

PF77, going dark.