Episode 9: Close Encounter & After the Rain Bath

Continuing directly from the events of last episode, NieA wakes up and does her morning aerobics on the roof. She climbs down in the room where Mayuko is still asleep and quietly sneaks to the fridge. Here, to her surprise, she finds the food that Mayuko wouldn�t share with her last night. Showing that she isn�t always thinking with her stomach, NieA leaves the food alone and instead sits and muses over the sleeping Mayuko for a while. She then comes to the conclusion that Mayuko is cranky due to a lack of nutrition and that she needs to help her. Before the sun has even risen, NieA is suited up and off on a junk collecting expedition to raise money to help Mayuko!

A little later, Mayuko wakes up and drags herself out of bed to do her newspaper route. The elderly couple she works for discuss that she has seemed down lately and that today it seems to be even worse. And Mayuko does indeed seem to be sleepwalking through her paper route. She only barely manages to muster a smile for Shuhei and Chie when she hands Shuhei the paper after coming upon the pair brushing their teeth. They, too, notice that she doesn�t seem to be her usual self.

After completing her paper route, Mayuko prepares to head into the city. She crosses paths with Yoshioka as he is getting the boiler ready for the day and he suggests she bring an umbrella�the weather report said it was going to rain. Mayuko looks at the clear blue sky and wonders if Yoshioka was being serious, but she grabs an umbrella nonetheless.

On the street outside the bathhouse, Mayuko meets Genzo who has come to visit with another large bag of rice. The bag is too heavy for Mayuko to lift so Genzo carries it up to her room for her. Once here, Mayuko serves barley tea for both of them while Genzo comments on the hole in the roof. Mayuko tells how NieA made it with a home-made UFO and the thought brings a real smile to her face for the first time in days. Genzo mentions that NieA seems to be wonderfully free in the way she lives her life, to which Mayuko responds that she is nothing but trouble. She mentions the voices NieA claims to have been hearing lately and wonders if the alien is teasing her or if it is her imagination.

Meanwhile, the topic of their conversation is trying to sell a load of scrap to a junk dealer as part of her quest to secure nutrition for Mayuko. The junk dealer isn�t particularly interested what she has brought, but he tells her about a fenced-off area where some clean-up of hazardous waste is taking place and says that he will pay good money for high-quality items retrieved from there. NieA doesn�t have be told twice and goes charging off.

Back in the village, it starts to rain. As it starts to rain, the awkward silences between Genzo and Mayuko finally seem to get to him and he says he has to get going. As he is leaving, he sees Mayuko�s watch sitting on her dresser. He says he is surprised that she still has her father�s watch, and Mayuko is amazed that he even knows it belonged to her father. Genzo suddenly even more taciturn than usual and even more eager to leave.

Mayuko wants to know how he knew that was her father�s watch, so she walks him to the bus stop. As she shelters them both from the rain with an umbrella, Genzo relates how Mayuko told him the watch belonged to her father when they were both kids. He also relates how Mayuko would always cheer him up after bullies had picked on him by telling him amazing and funny stories that she wrote. Mayuko has no recollection of ever making up stories, or any other of the childhood memories that Genzo has of the time they shared. Blushing, he tells her how happy she looked when she was telling him stories. The rain stops as Genzo�s bus arrives.

As Mayuko is walking home, her mood is somewhat lightened. It becomes even brighter when she sees a beautiful rainbow stretching across the fields around Enohana. She arrives back at the bathhouse just in time to receive a phone call from her mother. She asks about the stories she used to write and her mother promises to see if she can find any notebooks that might still be around from those days and send them to her.

Meanwhile NieA has penetrated deep into the fenced area and is surveying a wasteland of toxic scrap. A sudden fierce wid whips up, and the bizarre sound NieA has been hearing fills her head louder than ever. A mirage of the mother-ship seems to fill the sky, getting bigger and bigger, as the sound becomes overwhelming. NieA covers her ears, wincing in pain� and then the experience is over as quickly as it started.

Later, a strangely subdued NieA collects a handsome fee from the junk dealer. Walking back to Enohana, she is lost in thought, trying to figure out what the voice she keeps hearing means. She finally cries out in frustration over not being able to understand what�s going on, but then catches sight of a sign advertising an item at AM 11 PM 7�an item which NieA takes to be a nutrient-filled soft-shelled turtle.

When NieA comes home, she joyously presents Mayuko with a gift-wrapped box containing the nutritious turtle and Mayuko lets her scarf down the �feast� from two nights ago. However, when Mayuko opens the box, she finds that it contains a curry-colored model kit of a turtle that supposedly will make you powerful if you assemble it. Still, all she can do is smile; NieA was trying to be nice.

NieA, while sitting in the bath, has figured out what the voice has been saying: Sayonara. Now, she is trying to understand what that means.