クラナド アフターストーリー Episode 09
Clannad After Story 09

In the Illusionary World, Mystery Girl and Garbage Doll work on building a flying machine to escape the world before winter hits, when the girl will never move again.

In the real world, Nagisa and Tomoya are walking to school when Nagisa asks what Tomoya plans to do after he graduates. He changes the subject to getting a present for Nagisa, then going on a date with her, which frustrates her. At lunch, the two of them along with Tomoyo, Kyou, Ryou, Kotomi, and Youhei are having lunch and talking about the future, where again, Tomoya avoids the subject. However, it is then that Nagisa begins to slump over and is discovered to have a fever. Tomoya gets her home where it seems her mysterious illness has returned.

Time passes and Nagisa is missing lots of school, enough to make it almost impossible for her to graduate. Kyou and Ryou try to distract the clearly depressed Tomoya with Button, though it is only a short-term measure. Tomoya spends his free time with the bedridden Nagisa even though she tells him he can go “play” if he wants (like hang out with Youhei). He wants to be with her. Nagisa’s parents tell Tomoya that they are leaving the final decision on whether she tries to graduate or not to Nagisa. Tomoya declares that he doesn’t want to graduate without Nagisa, leading Akio-san to chastise him for this as it will make Nagisa feel terrible.

So, Tomoya continues his studies and spending time with Nagisa. He tells her of his desire to walk outside with her and hold her hand. At her birthday on Christmas Eve, a party is thrown for Nagisa with all her friends (including Misae-san) where Tomoya gives her a gift of a large, stuffed dango, which she loves. Time passes and Tomoya, Youhei, Kyou, Ryou, and Kotomi graduate. Tomoya returns home to find Nagisa outside waiting for him. He cries, telling her how he hated school until he met her and that he should have stayed behind another year to be with Nagisa. Nagisa tells him that he needs to move on with his life and the two take a short walk where they hold hands.

Thoughts/Review:

NOOOO! Nagisa is going to die, I just know it now after seeing this episode. WHHAAAAHHH! If that happens, I’m sure I’ll be crying like a baby.

As it is, this is the most emotional episode to date. I was stunned that Nagisa’s mysterious illness not only came back, but caused her to miss the rest of the school year as well. I know that in Clannad, this illness is what caused her to have to repeat a year, which caused her to meet Tomoya and the others. I guess I just thought she would be OK from here on, and that was easy to do considering not only the stories about the others, but some of the great humor moments. I guess I thought I’d get to see Tomoya and Nagisa graduate together.

That leads me to another surprise, which is the passage of time in this episode. Next episode, Tomoya is no longer in high school and I guess Nagisa returns to complete her 3rd year with Tomoyo and Yukine. That’s going to be weird because it seems to me that we won’t see Ryou, Kyou, and especially Kotomi-chan, who’s going to America to study.

I wonder if the Mystery Girl is somehow linked to Nagisa and Nagisa’s condition. I’ll be glad when we finally get some answers about the Illusionary World.

So, next episode moves us into new ground and it will be interesting to see where things go, though I fear the worst for Nagisa. I hope I’m wrong. ^_^;