SA: After forever neglecting to update this, I finish “I Do”!

Jinx: Your ending sucks.

SA: But I wanted it to end like this! I had just originally intended to make it bigger and more dramatic. Instead, I just toned it down.

Jinx: Out of laziness…

SA: SHUT UP! The entire purpose of this fic was just to give everyone hope. It wasn’t meant to be an epic. It’s all fluff. SO DEAL WITH IT!

Part 3

The Dream Is Reborn

The afternoon wore on, neither of the two lovers paying any attention to the time as it passed by. It was as if to them, time had simply stopped, and they were both trapped in this happy moment forever.

“Motoko, come with me. We can leave and go somewhere where no one would ever think to look for us. I have contacts in Taiwan and many other places where we would be welcome and free to live out our lives as we wished them,” Hideo finally whispered, breaking the silence, his pain obvious.

Motoko stared into his eyes sadly, unsure how to answer. “Hideo, I—I don’t think I can come with you. I may not be in Section 9 anymore, but New Port City still needs me. Before I found you I had decided that I was going to use my talent to help people. I can’t leave Japan, it’s my home, and it has been forever. Why can’t you stay here with me?” Motoko cried, her voice getting more out of control.

“Despite the fact that everyone thinks I’m dead, my face is all too recognizable in Japan. I have to leave, but I wasn’t going to do it until I found you again.” His usually expressionless face was taught with emotion. “ I have to leave. I’m planning on going back to Taiwan. If you don’t come with me, I’m afraid that I have to tell you not to contact me, for both of our safety. I doubt Gouda left no spies behind in Japan after his death.”

Motoko’s face twisted up in rage as she remembered the cruel, deformed man who had driven the two lovers apart seemingly forever.

“Will I ever see you again?” Motoko pleaded desperately. “Is there any way we can be happy?”

But in that moment, Hideo just smiled, moving his mouth. “Maybe goodbye doesn’t have to be forever, Motoko. Wait for me. I have no doubt in my heart that I will see you again.”

And then he was gone.

Early the next morning, Yosuke Aramaki woke up to find Hideo Kuze gone, and a note on his cot in his place.

“I cannot thank you enough for all that you’ve done for me and Motoko. But I’m afraid that this is when I must depart. I may see you again, friend, I may not. I do know, however, that this is not the end. Love will eventually flourish.

-Your Friend, Hideo Kuze.

Yosuke just sat back in his chair and smiled.

FIN