Disclaimer: I own nothing!
"Eh?"
Fujimoto blinked. Twice. This was a joke, right? Chitose was just joking...
The look on her face made that a little hard to believe.
"I thought she would have told you," the landlady continued, a stricken expression on her face, almost the same as the one he was so sure he was wearing.
"No..." he said, thoughts racing through his mind.
"It must have been hard for her to say..." Chitose said sadly. Fujimoto looked out the door.
"Did she say where she was going?" he asked. 'Please say yes...'
"No," she said. "Only that she'd get in touch when she settled in."
That did it. He had to find her. Before he knew it, his legs were moving on their own.
"Kobato!" he called out. "Kobato!"
He ran across town, repeating her name over and over.
Thoughts raced to his head while he ran.
What if she had already left? What if he could never see her again? Was she leaving because of the nursery? Or...was he the reason why? How could she do this to Chitose, to the twins, to Sayaka, to him?
Her words from yesterday came to mind.
"I...won't be able to spend tomorrow with you."
Is this what she meant?
"If Fujimoto-san is happy, then I'm happy."
He felt guilty. 'Kobato...' he thought. 'Did you think I'd be happy if you left?'
A determined look stuck itself on his face. He was going to find her no matter what.
'Kobato! Where are you?'
After running all over town he found her finally at the park. She was standing on top of one of the many props around the playground, specifically the slide, surrounded by cherry blossoms, her suitcase next to her.
'What is she doing there?' he thought absently. All he knew was that he needed to speak to her. He ran up to her as fast as he could at that point.
Kobato turned to face him, a confused expression on her face that served to anger Fujimoto a bit. She was leaving, and yet she was the one that seemed lost?
"What the hell are you doing?" he near growled, panting from his little run across town.
Kobato looked at him with that same wondering look. "Fujimoto-san..." she said, as if she hadn't expected to see him again.
"Where are you going?" Fujimoto asked, making sure he didn't take his eyes off her in case she decided to flee.
She said simply, "I don't know."
In his head that only confirmed his suspicion of her leaving because of him. He didn't like the way his heart hurt at that thought.
"Don't give me that!" he shouted angrily.
Kobato only smiled. "Even in the end, you're angry," she said.
'The end?' he thought. He willed the thought away.
"Of course I am! You can't just disappear without saying anything!" he yelled. Maybe...Maybe he could get some common sense through her head, then she'd come home and be an annoyance like always...
Kobato bowed and uttered an apology. He didn't want her to apologize. He didn't want confirmation for her leaving. He didn't want to believe she was leaving in the first place. He looked up at her with hurt eyes.
"Did...I hurt your feelings?" he asked, sorrow wrapping around those words.
"No!" Kobato shouted desperately. "That's not it!"
Somehow her immediate denial did little to sooth the ache in his chest.
"Then why?" he shot back. It was what had been haunting him all night. Why was Kobato leaving?
She looked away, sadness tinting her eyes.
A moment of silence passed between them. Why wouldn't she answer him?
"...Because of the contract," a voice answered. Kobato looked as surprised as he did. He had recognized the voice. It was the one that was always yelling at Kobato back at the apartment. But where had it come from?
He looked around. "Who's there?" he called out.
"I'm up here," it answered. "On top of her suitcase."
Fujimoto looked up. The blue stuffed dog that Kobato had always dragged around folded its arms and greeted him. He stared in shock.
"This is Ioryogo," Kobato explained.
"But...he's a stuffed toy..." Fujimoto said, having not yet get over the surprise.
"That's just what I pretend to be," he said gruffly. Fujimoto took a few seconds to process what was going on.
"Anyway," Ioryogi continued, "about that contract. Kobato, show him."
"Eh?" Kobato asked, before realizing what was said. She reached up for her hat, a resigned look on her face before she agreed.
Fujimoto had never seen her without a hat. Now, from what Ioryogi had just said, there seemed to be a dark and sinister reason behind it. He felt like he was better off not knowing.
"O-Oi," he called out in an attempt to stop her. "What are you doing?"
She took the hat off anyway. He gasped at the sight of a blue, softly glowing floating crown above her head. It was beautifully sad, he thought. It looked beautifully sad.
"What is that?" he asked when he found his voice.
Ioryogi looked down. "She's dead. This crown means she's dead," he said flatly.
Fujimoto couldn't believe his ears. Kobato...lively, energetic Kobato...was dead?
"Kobato's soul doesn't belong to any world," the dog continued. "It wanders, attached to no life."
He wanted to yell for the dog to stop it, to stop telling him such painful things. Every word he spoke hurt. But Fujimoto remained quiet, hearing Ioryogi's explanation through.
After all, Ioryogi spoke as if every word hurt him, too.
"Thanks to a contract with someone higher up, Kobato was given a chance to be reborn just one time and live her life over."
Fujimoto couldn't take it anymore. "Wait!" he shouted. "What is this?"
He was promptly ignored.
Ioryogi spoke sadly now. "But...she was more worried about spending her time with you rather than fulfilling the contract...And thus the contract..."
Fujimoto noticed for the first time the small flower-wielding flying bunny behind Kobato. It pointed its flower at her.
"...was broken."
The bunny's flower began to glow, and Kobato's crown reacted by giving off a bright rainbow-colored ring of light that extended itself from the earth to the heavens.
She only smiled.
"That's why I have to go away now," she said.
'No...' Fujimoto thought. 'No!'
The organ player's first reaction was to run up the slide to where Kobato stood, now trapped within the pillar of light.
He reached out for her, only to find that the strange light stopped him. "No way!" he yelled. "Come out of there right now!"
She was still smiling when she told him, "I was very happy when I was with you."
'No! Please don't say that! Please don't make it sound like you're leaving forever...'
Before he realized it, Kobato had begun to cry, though her smile remained in place. "This...this is no good..."
The young man looked in surprise when she moved her hand to where his was on the other side of the pillar.
"I...wanted to say good-bye with a smile..."
Fujimoto's eyes widened and his heart sunk to his stomach when he heard those. She'd been forcing herself to smile for his sake? How sad was she behind that smile of hers?
The bunny spun around, and Kobato winced in pain as the light intensified.
"Wait!" he yelled frantically. "Please stop!"
"...Fujimoto-san..." Kobato said, her voice so fragile it sounded like it would break at any moment. He looked at her desperately.
"You are...the person I've cared about most," she said. "I always have..." she smiled, "...and always will."
'No...don't confess like this. It looks like you're saying good-bye...'
"Don't go!" he yelled, unaware of the glow in his chest.
Suddenly the pillar cracked and shattered like glass. He unconsciously looked away to keep the shards out of his eyes. When he looked up, he had to say he'd never felt more relieved and happy than he did when he saw Kobato standing there in front of him, smiling as usual.
He didn't notice that bright light that had come out from his chest until it entered the bottle on the girls' suitcase. The light transformed into a piece of star candy and began to fill the bottle up to the brim with a bright green substance. A powerful force swirled around the bottle as it filled. The dove smiled. The bottle flew up and, gently, she took it into her hands and held it to her chest as if it were the dearest thing in the world.
"Fujimoto-san's candy...it feels so warm..."
Ioryogi growled. "This isn't a gift!" he cried out. "It's a curse!"
The stuffed dog looked over to the rabbit. "Please! Let her be reborn in this world!"
The bunny only smiled and shook its head. With a wave of its flower the sakura petals began surrounding the small group.
Ioryogi growled and breathed out a huge flame, which the bunny blocked with its flower.
"Dammit!" he cried, helpless, Fujimoto realized.
Kobato stood amidst the swirling petals, a content expression on her face.
"What's going on?" Fujimoto asked, concerned.
"There's a place I must go to," was the girl's simple reply.
She looked up at him and smiled as she said, "Sayonara."
He didn't want her to go. He wanted her to annoy him to death about chores he shouldn't be doing since he broke his right arm or talking complete and total nonsense. He wanted her to sing that beautiful song of hers or smile over something so small he would have missed it the first time. The story "Promise of the Firefly" came into mind. He was like that firefly that had forgotten how to glow, he realized, and Kobato had shown him how.
At this point the girl had begun to glow. Fujimoto reached out and tried to embrace her. There was so much he wanted to tell her. There was so much he wanted to do with her. There was so much, and yet he couldn't speak a word.
'Don't go, Kobato, I...I...!'
The girl turned into flower petals at his touch. Soon she was gone and flying with the wind. The only thing left to him was the warmth of the air from where she used to be.
'I love you, Kobato...' he thought, before his world went black.
I loved this episode and decided to try writing it out. This is what I got. . I apologize for the OOCness of Fujimoto! Please review!