And thus the ending begins. Remember to review afterwards, please?

seven chapters anticipated now. THIS THIS WILL NOT END.

Watanuki hadn't expected to turn up here of all places, but here he was in the park with a satisfied-looking Yuuko standing over him and not helping him up. "Our hero returns," she commented. "You're in debt, Watanuki!" With a smirk, she skipped away toward a bag that probably contained inordinate amounts of alcohol and sat down next to it. "What will you do now?"

It seemed like an innocent question, but Watanuki had the feeling that it carried a great deal more weight than that. "I," he began, and stopped. "I have to…" Talk to Doumeki, he thought, but he would not say that out loud, especially not in present company. "I need to…"

"I have something for you to do," Yuuko told him slyly. "A small errand, not too far from here. And then…" here she grinned evilly, "then we'll need you back for the Watanuki welcome-home party!"

"For which I'll be cooking?" Watanuki asked sullenly.

"But of course!"

With a sigh, Watanuki accepted the fate of lifelong kitchen slave as inevitable and stood up. "What's the errand?" he inquired heavily. "It involves a bunch of hungry spirits trying to eat me and all sorts of unwelcome tag-alongs, right?"

"Not really." Yuuko's grin widened. "But you're right about Doumeki being involved."

"I NEVER SAID ANYTHING ABOUT THAT!" yelled Watanuki in lieu of contemplating the emotions that such a prospect stirred up. Adrenaline most assuredly did not surge, and nor did he find himself relieved. Or if he did, it was only because at some point he was going to have to confront the jerk, and the sooner such pain was dealt with, the better.

Yuuko sent him a knowing and superior Look but didn't comment. "Take this to Doumeki-kun's shrine, and deliver it in person," she said, holding out a folded slip of paper. "In person is important."

"Can't you just tell him yourself?" Watanuki grumbled, taking the paper anyway and stalking off.

"But it's more fun this way!" Yuuko called after him gleefully. Only after he had gone did her smile turn softer. "Besides, if he doesn't see Watanuki there, who knows what he'll do?"

--

Shizuka stood on the corner, resisting the temptation to rest his eyes on the concrete below him, and wondered what he was going to do. It was not that he didn't know what he was doing – he always knew exactly what he was doing – but that this knowledge did not extend past the immediate. Clutched in one hand was another letter, as sparse as the first. I'm coming to find you, it said. I don't care if Yuuko-san says it's impossible. He hadn't gotten much better at letter-writing the second time, as he'd expected. Such things took time.

He'd found what he was looking for at the university – merely the mundane. He'd walked the hallways and watched the students and spoken to professors, and generally had found it to be a good school. Normal. A place he could go to readjust himself to what might be referred to 'the real world.'

So he'd paid careful attention to it while he was there, and then turned down the offer and gone home with his perplexed father.

The walk back from the train station could be altered to pass Yuuko's shop, so he said he would return home in a short amount of time and excused himself to take the long way. And here he was now, on the corner from which the shop entrance could be seen. He didn't really want to approach it now, even though he knew he would be able to see it. The unfulfilled wish only might have had something to do with this, but more likely it was that he had become a customer once and would always be a customer.

Then again, he'd been able to see the shop because it was necessary for Watanuki. And Watanuki was elsewhere, and didn't need assistance because his problem was for all intents and purposes cured. A trip to Yuuko's now would be nothing but nostalgia. Shizuka had a wish, yes, but he'd asked already and had been refused.

He had broken down and asked about a week after Watanuki's departure, and Yuuko had smiled almost sadly and denied him. "This is something you couldn't afford," she'd said. "The toil of years wasn't enough either, but he paid in other ways – ways you would not be able to pay." Shizuka had understood. It was not the same, when the act of travel was the wish and not the means. He'd heard of the price paid for a similar wish, and supposed he could count himself lucky that his memory had not been demanded in exchange for what hadn't been granted.

"He's out of your reach, Doumeki-kun," she had continued. "That is a price in and of itself."

And now here he was again at Yuuko's gate, through which he could see the fairly grandiose house, yard a great deal more unkempt than it had been the last time. The letter wasn't on the step anymore, which was hopefully an indication of a successful delivery and not an indication of juvenile delinquency in the area. After another moment of hesitation, he pushed through and stepped into Yuuko's garden.

But Yuuko was nowhere to be seen. As he opened the door to the shop itself, the two girls who never left came pelting down the hall in an overenthusiastic attempt to greet "their" guest. "It's Doumeki-kun!" exclaimed the one with blue hair, taking hold of his right arm. "Doumeki-kun!" echoed the other, taking his left. "It's been so long!" they cried in unison.

"Where is Yuuko-san?" he asked of them.

They immediately ceased their antics. "Mistress isn't home right now," they chanted. "Mistress is busy."

Shizuka hadn't been running on raw purpose – he rarely did outside of life-or-death situations – but he had been counting on getting his answer quickly. Before his life could pull him away from the dangerously small window he still had. Somehow, he knew that letting his chance slip away for an interesting life, one containing Watanuki, would be the worst possible choice he could make. But Yuuko wasn't here. She'd probably known he would be here, but that wasn't an issue. It was not an impossible wish to grant for him, simply difficult to pay for and probably requiring some creativity on Shizuka's part. Perhaps everything was predecided by each action of each second, but nothing was ever set in stone until it had already happened.

In the mean time, there was something he could still do. "I have a letter for Watanuki," he said, holding it out to the girl nearest him. But she shook her head gravely.

"We can't deliver it," the twin girls chorused.

Shizuka stared, barely comprehending and bewildered. "Watanuki is gone from where we can deliver him letters," they explained apologetically. "We can't reach him now."

After a moment of shock and hideous, irrational fear, Shizuka summoned up a weak "Oh," and followed it up with a "Thank you." Then, for lack of anything better to do, he bowed and left the way he came.

"Sorry," he heard the two girls call after him before the door closed.

Shizuka barely paid heed to the rest of the walk home, wrapped up in speculations. He didn't know much about the limitations of Yuuko's shop and the people who resided within, but Watanuki had said that the two girls would be able to reach him, and now they weren't. Which meant that whatever had caused this was unexpected, and also rather sudden. There wasn't much that could get around Yuuko's magic; offhand, Shizuka could only think of a few. Watanuki could have moved to another location that Yuuko had not identified yet. He could have entered a place where magic could have reached.

He could have…died.

Suddenly terrified that this could be so, Shizuka broke into a completely unnecessary run and did not stop for another few blocks. He finally stopped when he nearly went the wrong way and had to pause, at which point he conceded that running would get him absolutely nowhere with this. He was in the wrong dimension to do anything.

And death was not the only possibilty. There was no point in panicking until he knew for certain. And Yuuko should be back eventually, at which point he would return and demand his wish be granted. To hell with the consequences. Hitsuzen was not a great concern of his; nor was danger.

He turned onto his road and reflected that once he wouldn't have been concerned with Watanuki either. That had changed.

There was still time to change the rest.

--